Same-sex marriages: 3% of unions in 2024, a stability that speaks volumes

In 2024, 6,750 same-sex marriages united two people in France, a drop in the ocean compared to all unions, but a steady one: the proportion has varied little since 2015, according to the latest figures published by INSEE. In detail, the distribution is almost perfectly balanced, with 47% of marriages between two women and 53% between two men, a sign that marriage, once the political turmoil subsided, has become a discreet, almost routine, administrative part of the country.

Let's rewind a bit. The peak occurred just after the law of May 17, 2013: 7,400 same-sex couples married between May and December 2013, then 10,500 in 2014—a classic catch-up effect for couples who had been waiting for years for the right to say "I do" at the town hall. Then, the momentum slowed: 7,800 in 2015, 6,300 in 2019, then the shock of Covid in 2020, like for everyone else. Since 2022, the number has hovered around 6,800 per year. In total, 84,000 same-sex marriages were celebrated between 2013 and 2024, but marriage remains far from being the majority choice for these couples: in the 2022 census, 39% declared themselves married, 25% in a civil partnership and 36% without marriage or civil partnership.

Paris, age gaps, local roots: marital trajectories that are not alike

Paris, age gaps, local roots: marital trajectories that are not all alike. What INSEE (the French National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies) shows above all is that not all married couples are the same. Married male couples have a striking Parisian tendency: more than one in ten lives within the city limits of Paris, three times more than female couples or heterosexual couples. They also marry more often far from their home department, 55% compared to 44% for female couples and 43% for heterosexual couples, as if the map of marriage sometimes followed that of mobility, careers, and major cities. Another distinctive feature is the age gap: seven years on average for male couples, compared to 4,8 years for female couples and four years for heterosexual couples.

Conversely, female couples who marry appear to be more concentrated outside urban centers: 34% reside in rural areas and 32% in medium-density urban areas, higher proportions than for male couples. Their share of same-sex marriages, 47% in 2024, also exceeds their share of all same-sex couples (43% in 2022), a difference that INSEE attributes to the more frequent presence of children and the long-standing legal framework that encouraged the establishment of parentage, as access to dual parentage was, until recently, easier for married couples. The result is a snapshot of a France where same-sex marriage is no longer truly increasing but is not declining either, having become a statistical norm… against a backdrop of life choices that continue to shape very different geographical patterns and life paths.