After a dip due to the pandemic, the number of marriages in England and Wales rose to 246,897 in 2022, a massive 12.3% higher than in 2019, according to data released by the Office for National Statistics this week.
It's likely that the increase can be attributed to the number of couples who postponed their weddings beyond 2021, to avoid Covid restrictions. View the full covid timeline here.
There was also a record number of same-sex marriages in 2022, a total of 7,800, which accounted for 3.2% of all marriages. The main contributing factor to this significant rise was the number of female same-sex marriages which reached 4,896, the highest since same-sex marriage was introduced in 2014.
Typical age of couples marrying in 2022
- In 2022 we saw the highest ever median age for men marrying, at 32.7 years of age or 36.2 for those entering a same-sex marriage.
- The median age for women was 31.2 for opposite sex marriage and 32.6 for same-sex marriage.
- The 30-34 age bracket was the most common for both men and women
- When it comes to remarriage in 2022, men were typically in their 60s while women were in their early 50s.
The most popular dates and regions
- The South East was the most popular region to to tie the knot, and accounted for 16.4% of all marriages in England and Wales in 2022. This remains unchanged from 2019.
- Saturdays continued to be the most popular day of the week to get married. 43.6% of all weddings in 2022 took place on a Saturday.
- The last Saturday of July and the first Saturday of September are consistently the most popular dates. In 2022, the most popular day for marriages was Saturday the 30th July, with 3,608 weddings taking place across England and Wales.
- Christmas Day remained the least popular day on which to say "I do", with only three weddings taking place on that day in 2022.
Marriage - v - Civil Partnerships?
94.2% of legal partnership formations in 2022 were marriages between opposite sex couples, and 3.1% were marriages between same-sex couples. In addition to marriage, since 2004 there has also been the option to form a legal partnership by means of a civil partnership; originally an option for same-sex couples and later for anyone. In 2022, there were a total of 6,879 civil partnerships making up 2.7% of all legal partnership formations. The majority of these were opposite-sex civil partnership formations (2.3%), while 0.4% were same-sex civil partnerships. For more information on Civil Partnerships please see the Civil partnership in England and Wales: 2022 bulletin.
Shifting trends
More couples are choosing to cohabit (live together without being married) than ever before, with 9 out of 10 living together before marriage. This has increased from 6 out of 10 cohabiting prior to marriage in 1994.
More than three quarters of people marrying in 2022 (77.4% of men and 78.7% of women) have never married before. This increases for same-sex couples with 89% of men and 81% of women not having been married before, largely due to the relatively recent introduction of same-sex marriage.
The full government marriage data source for 2022 can be found on the Office of National Statistics Website.