Number of weddings and civil unions drops again, down 3 percent from 2025

New figures from Stats NZ show the number of marriages and civil unions in New Zealand has fallen again, down 3 percent from 2025 to just under 17,500.

Kirsty Ussher, a Wānaka-based celebrant and wedding planner, told Morning Report the way people mark and celebrate their commitment was changing.

"I think the whole concept of marriage over the last few years has really become quite diluted.

"I feel like people are committed to each other in different ways, and don't necessarily feel like they need that piece of paper anymore to prove it legally."

StatsNZ reported 17,481 marriages and civil unions were registered in New Zealand in 2025, including 444 same-sex marriages or civil unions. That's down from 18,033 in 2024.

While the number of those getting married is trending down, Ussher said it's still big business in central Otago.

"Wanaka and Queenstown are definitely an outlier. I think there's contributing factors to those stats. It's on the decline, but not down here in this wedding bubble."

That Queenstown wedding bubble is increasingly popular as a destination internationally.

A total of 2565 overseas couples travelled to New Zealand to marry in 2025, up from 2418 couples in 2024.

More than half of those came from Australia, nine percent coming from both the United States and the UK, and seven percent from China, including Hong Kong.

Of those international weddings taking place in New Zealand, 213 were same-sex couples.

Many of those coming from countries where same-sex marriage wasn't legal such as China and Singapore.

Getting married later in life

In 2025, the median age of those having their first marriage was 30.5 years for women and 31.6 years for men. In 2005, those figures were 28.2 and 30.1 years and in 1971, when marriage rates were at their highest, the median age was 20.8 years for women and 23.0 years for men.

Ussher said most of her couples were in their early to mid-thirties.

"They might be the ones that have the money to be able to afford to get married down here, then we're just starting to see some Gen-Z's come through. So those in their mid-to-late twenties, that's the bulk of them."

The cost of marriage

Ussher said there had been a definite trend towards smaller weddings as the cost of hosting guests continues to rise.

"I would say, the average cost of a wedding sits around about $60,000.

"That would include everything. I'm talking about your attire, your rings, the venue, the food, and styling.

"We're seeing people choosing to elope, just the two of them spending money on just themselves for a nice weekend away."

She said venues, catering and alcohol were the biggest costs.

"We know that food costs have risen, so obviously that's now being reflected in what caterers are having to charge. And, alcohol.

"People drink a lot of alcohol at weddings. So the more guests you have who are drinkers, the more cost you're going to incur.

"That's not to say we're not still seeing fantastic, big celebratory weddings with 150 guests. Those are still happening."

"There's some weddings that push up closer to $100,000 and then we're still getting people who are managing to do weddings for around $30,000 with a decent guest list of about 80 people."

The data also revealed 7887 couples got a divorce, with just over a third of marriages ending in divorce before the 25th wedding anniversary.

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