The fertility rate was stable in 2024, but it's still near record lows

As the Trump administration renews its focus on declining birth rates in the U.S., new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggests that births were fairly stable in 2024, rising 1% over the year prior.

As the Trump administration renews its focus on declining birth rates in the U.S., new data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention suggests that births were fairly stable in 2024, rising 1% over the year prior.  

There were 3,622,673 births in the U.S. last year, according to a CDC report released Wednesday. Overall, the number of births declined by 2% per year, on average, from 2015 through 2020 and fluctuated in the years since, according to the report. 

The report also estimated the birth rate among women ages 15 to 44, referred to more specifically as the fertility rate. The rate declined from 2014 to 2020, then fluctuated through 2024. The fertility rate last year was 54.6 births per 1,000 women, the report found — a 0.2% uptick compared with 2023.

Brady Hamilton, the report’s main author and a CDC statistician, said the data marks “a continuation of the general downward trend in births to teenagers and upward trend in births to older women seen for the last three or so decades.” However, he said the CDC could not speak to the reasons behind the trend. 

Sociologists who examined the CDC data said it largely reflects women who delayed having children in their 20s finally choosing to do so in their 30s and 40s. Birth rates increased last year among women ages 25 to 44, but declined among teenagers and those under 25.