U.S. Fertility Rate Remains Near Record Low

Total fertility rate (TFR) provides a snapshot of fertility trends in a given year. It estimates the average number of children a woman would have over her lifetime if she lived through her reproductive years and experienced the age-specific fertility rates observed that year. TFR does not provide detailed information about female or male reproductive health; rather,

it uses annual birthing data to project how many children women in a population are likely to have on average.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported the U.S. total fertility rate remains near record lows at 1.63 births per woman in 2024, up slightly from 1.62 in 2023. The TFR remains well below the number of births needed to offset deaths and emigration to keep the U.S. population stable, considered to be approximately 2.1 births per woman. The total number of live births in 2024 was approximately 3.62 million; the number of births declined by an average 2% per year from 2015 through 2020 and has fluctuated since.

Looking at demographic patterns from 2023 to 2024, the provisional number of births declined by 4% for Black women, 3% for American Indian and Alaska Native women, and less than 1% for White women, while births rose by 4% for Hispanic women, 5% for Asian women, and remained essentially unchanged for Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander women.

Between 2023 and 2024, birth rates declined among females aged 15–24—marking record lows for teens and women in their early twenties—increased for women aged 25–44, and remained unchanged for the youngest (aged 10–14) and oldest (aged 45–49) reproductive age groups.

This trend reflects a broader shift in family planning, with women increasingly choosing to have children later in life, having fewer children, or forgoing motherhood entirely.