Map Reveals States With Most Married Couples

Researchers have trawled through marriage certificates to compile a list of the U.S. states most likely to see a couple head down the aisle.

The statistics were collated by the National Center for Health Statistics, which is part of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), and the most up-to-date figures are from 2021.

Nevada is where wedding bells are heard the most, according to the map, while Louisiana has the fewest marriages per 1,000 people.

Marriage rates have been in free fall across the U.S., plummeting by roughly 60 percent over the past 50 years, according to the National Center for Family & Marriage Research. Millennials, for instance, have been forgoing the ceremony that many couples in the generations before them had viewed as an adult rite of passage.

However, the drop in marriages has been accompanied by a fall in divorce rates. Some experts say that's due to couples choosing to marry after establishing themselves professionally and financially first, picking partners based on love and friendship rather than any sense of social obligation.

But it's possible marriages may be set to rise again. In 2022, the U.S. "witnessed a significant uptick in the number of marriages, reaching a total of 2,065,905," according to a blog by CDC public affairs specialist Brian Tsai this March. This was the first time the number tipped the 2 million mark since 2019. The 2022 average marriage rate across the U.S. was 6.2 per 1,000 of the population, the highest rate since 2018.

The marriage rate map, which uses slightly older information and presents state figures, offers a fascinating picture of how the trend is playing out across the country. It can be viewed below or on the CDC's website.

Nevada is an outlier, with 26.2 marriages "per 1,000 [of the] total population residing in [the] area." That definition appears to suggest the figures have not been skewed by out-of-towners heading to Las Vegas to get hitched. However, another CDC report clarifies that "rates reflect the location where the marriage occurred and do not necessarily indicate the place of residence."

Other states with high marriage rates are Montana (11); Utah (9.1); Wyoming, Idaho and Vermont (all 7.4); Arkansas (8.2); and Alabama and Tennessee (both 7.6).

Texas (5.8) and Oregon (5.7) had slightly fewer marriages per 1,000 people.

Meanwhile, Louisiana had the lowest rate in the country in 2021, with an average of just 4.4 weddings for every 1,000 people. Other states less likely to play host to a wedding party were California and New York (both at 5.2) and Illinois (4.7).

When the map is set back even further in time, to 2020, Nevada still comes out with the highest marriage rate, at 21, while Louisiana remains the lowest, at 3.2. And back in 2019, Nevada was the highest, with 25.9, and Texas was the lowest, with 4.9. That year Louisiana was 5.1.

Newsweek reached out to the National Center for Health Statistics via an email to the CDC for further information and comment on the findings.

In an essay published by the Institute for Family Studies in November 2019, author Marina Adshade said various studies suggest that marriage makes people happier and healthier, but she noted that there were numerous caveats and some limitations in the research.

She concluded that "we have something to learn from the benefits that marriage bestows on men and women. Not necessarily that we need to take action to increase marriage rates, but at least to recognize the role of social connectivity in making people happier and healthier. Ensuring that people have good social networks seems like a reasonable personal and societal goal."

At the other end of the spectrum, a similar map for divorce rates was created recently, showing the states where married couples are most likely to end up calling in the lawyers.