U.S. Bureau of the Census
01/28/2026 | Press release | Distributed by Public on 01/28/2026 08:50
Births to Unmarried Women Declined Over the Past Decade, New Data Show
JAN. 28, 2026 -The percentage of women with a recent birth who were unmarried decreased by 4.8 percentage points, from 35.7% (or under 1.5 million) in 2011 to 30.9% (or 1.2 million) in 2023, according to a new U.S. Census Bureau report titled Social and Economic Characteristics of Currently Unmarried Women With a Recent Birth: 2023.
In 2023, four million women ages 15 to 50 gave birth in the last year. Of the 1.2 million women with a recent birth who were unmarried, 35.5% (or around 450,000) lived with an unmarried partner.
The report uses 2023 American Community Survey (ACS) data to explore social and economic characteristics of unmarried women with a recent birth and makes comparisons, when possible, to an earlier report that used 2011 ACS 1-year estimates.
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