Unmarried births decline nationwide over past decade, census data show

WASHINGTON - Unmarried births have declined across the United States over the past decade, with new Census Bureau data showing that fewer than one-third of women who gave birth in 2023 were unmarried, down nearly five percentage points from 2011.

By the numbers:

The share of women with a recent birth who were unmarried fell by 4.8 percentage points over the past decade, dropping from 35.7%, or just under 1.5 million women, in 2011 to 30.9%, or 1.2 million, in 2023, according to a new U.S. Census Bureau report.

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 In 2023, about four million women ages 15 to 50 gave birth in the previous year, and of the unmarried mothers, roughly 35.5%, or about 450,000 women, lived with an unmarried partner.

Dig deeper:

From 2011 to 2023, the share of women with a recent birth who were unmarried either declined or showed no statistically significant change in every U.S. state and the District of Columbia, according to the report.

By age, unmarried births remained most common among teenagers. In 2023, 90.1% of women ages 15 to 19 who had given birth in the previous year were unmarried. However, the total number of unmarried teen mothers fell sharply over the period, dropping by more than half—from 216,436 in 2011 to 82,530 in 2023.

Educational attainment also shaped marital status trends among women with recent births. In 2023, about half of women with less than a high school education (48.9%) and high school graduates or GED holders (47.9%) who gave birth in the past year were unmarried, a difference that was not statistically significant. 

In 2011, higher shares of both groups were unmarried, particularly among women without a high school diploma, 57.0% of whom had a recent birth outside marriage. While the percentage of unmarried mothers declined among women with less than a high school education over the period, it did not change significantly among high school graduates or GED holders.

The share of women with a recent birth who held a bachelor’s degree increased over the same period, rising from 8.8% in 2011 to 11.4% in 2023.

Regionally, several states reported higher-than-average shares of recent births to unmarried women, including Alabama, Florida, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, Ohio, South Carolina, Texas, and West Virginia. By contrast, states with lower-than-average shares included Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Minnesota, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Dakota, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin.