Maldives sees biggest marriage dip in five years in 2025, highest divorce rate

The Maldives recorded its biggest decline in marriages and also the highest divorce rates in the last five years in 2025, according to data released by the Maldives Bureau of Statistics.

The 2026 Maldives statistical pocketbook shows that 5,148 couples got married last year – marking a decline from the four previous years.

• 2021: 5,414 marriages
• 2022: 5,753 marriages
• 2023: 5,373 marriages
• 2024: 5,170 marriages
• 2025: 5,148 marriages

The divorce rate remained lower than the marriage rate throughout the last five years. However, 3,546 couples registered their divorces last year – marking the highest divorce rate in the last five years.

• 2021: 3,242 divorces
• 2022: 3,311 divorces
• 2023: 3,401 divorces
• 2024: 3,464 divorces
• 2025: 3,546 divorces

The Maldives, an island nation of half-a-million people, has the highest divorce rate per capita in the world.

A study published on the Maldives National University (MNU) National Journal of Research in 2024, based on divorcees aged 18 to 39 in the greater Male’ area, shows that primary factors contributing to divorce included immaturity, infidelity, incompatibility, financial instability, congested living conditions, marrying for the wrong reasons, domestic violence, and substance abuse.