Divorce Statistics

The following table illustrates the trends in divorce rates from 1988 to 2007.

Selected divorce indicators – Australia: Selected years – 1988-2007

			1988	1998	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007

Divorces granted		no.	41 007	51 370	53 145	52 747	52 399	51 375	47 963
Crude divorce rate(a)			2.5	2.7	2.7	2.6	2.6	2.5	2.3
Divorces involving children(b)
	Proportion of all divorces	%	57.5	53.4	50.1	49.8	49.8	50.1	49.3
	Average number of children per divorce(c)	no.	1.88	1.88	1.87	1.87	1.87	1.88	1.88
Median age at divorce
	Males	years	37.6	40.5	42.6	43.0	43.5	43.9	44.2
	Females	years	34.8	37.8	39.9	40.3	40.8	41.1	41.3
Median length of marriage
	To separation	years	7.3	7.8	8.7	8.7	8.8	8.9	8.9
	To divorce	years	10.1	11.2	12.2	12.3	12.6	12.5	12.5
Type of applicant(d)
	Male	no.	15 280	16 004	17 229	16 365	16 020	15 171	13 216
	Female	no.	21 015	25 380	22 870	21 614	21 398	20 574	18 571
	Joint	no.	4 712	9 986	13 046	14 768	14 955	15 582	16 172

(a) Per 1,000 estimated resident population at 30 June. See Glossary and Explanatory Notes 26 and 31 for more information.
(b) Unmarried children of the marriage who were aged under 18 years at the time of application for divorce. See Glossary for more information.
(c) Excludes divorces not involving children.
(d) Excludes divorces where type of applicant is not stated.

DIVORCES GRANTED

The number of divorces granted in Australia have been decreasing each year since reaching a peak in 2001.

This trend continued in 2007 with 47,963 divorces granted in comparison to 51,375 in 2006, showing a decrease of 3,412 or 6.6% over this period. The number of divorces granted in 2007 was 9.8% lower than five years ago, but only 6.6% lower than 10 years ago due to a peak in the number of divorces granted in 2001.

Divorces granted: Australia – 1988-2007

Graph: Divorces granted: Australia—1988–2007