The haven for honeymooners where everyone gets divorced
The divorce rate in England and Wales has reached a record low, with marriages now lasting for an average of 12.2 years. According to the ONS, rates have been steadily falling for the past 13 years after peaking in the early 1990s.
But how does the UK divorce rate compare with the rest of the world? As the map below shows, it matches up pretty evenly with most other European nations. Those countries shown in darker colours have the highest rate (annual divorces per 1,000 residents, according to the latest figures available from the United Nations Statistical Division), and those in lighter hues the lowest. We were unable to find figures for those countries shown in grey.
For the UK, the figure is 1.9 per 1,000 inhabitants, the same as France and Norway, and slightly lower than Spain (2.1), Portugal (2.2) and Germany (2).
The UK certainly has some way to go to match the divorce capital of the world. Ironically, given that it's so popular with honeymooners, it is the Maldives. The island nation has previously reported a divorce rate of 10.97 per 1,000 residents, earning it recognition in the Guinness Book of Records. The UN once estimated that the average Maldivian woman, by the age of 30, has been divorced three times.
Admittedly, that figure of 10.97 dates back to the year 2002. But more recent statistics indicate a lingering predilection for break-ups. According to the country's Department for National Planning, 3,011 couples got divorced in 2012. That works out at around 7.2 annual divorces per 1,000 inhabitants. In 2015, that rose to 3,358, or 8 per 1,000.
Why is the rate so high in the Maldives? Various reasons have been cited. Perhaps the most compelling is that, as in other Muslim societies, where premarital sex is taboo, many marry young, but, under the country's mixed Sharia and common law system, they can then secure a divorce relatively easily when things don't work out. Others have blamed a lack of childcare facilities combined with a rise in women entering the workforce.
"The phenomenon is complex but the reason is quite simple; it is due to the socio-economic shift that is taking place in the Maldives," suggested one resident on the website Quora. "While getting married was seen as a necessity in the past... today’s women are more empowered and financially independent [and] less likely suffer an unhappy marriage. The social stigma towards divorce and getting re-married is also less now than it used to be."
Russia, Belarus, the US, and another tropical idyll - Aruba - complete the top 5. The UK is tied at 38th out of the 104 destinations for which statistics were obtainable. The lowest divorce rates are often found in countries with large Catholic populations, such as Chile, Colombia and Ireland, as well as Muslim countries like Libya, Uzbekistan and Bahrain.
The 20 places where divorce is most common
Maldives - 10.97 per year per 1,000 inhabitants
Russia - 4.8
Aruba - 4.4
Belarus - 4.1
United States - 3.6
Lithuania - 3.2
Gibraltar - 3
Moldova - 3
Denmark - 2.9
Cuba - 2.9
Ukraine - 2.8
Hong Kong - 2.76
Latvia - 2.6
Jordan - 2.6
Estonia - 2.6
Finland - 2.5
San Marino - 2.5
Czech Republic - 2.5
Costa Rica - 2.5
Sweden - 2.5
The ONS also produces figures showing what proportion of marriages in any given year subsequently ended in divorce. You can explore this data using the interactive tool below.
Of the 344,334 couples who tied the knot in 1983 a whopping 43 per cent subsequently divorced, compared to just 27 per cent of marriages from 1963.
