Health · 1909 — Present

America's Birth Rate

1.60births / woman

The 2024 total fertility rate — a record low, and well below the 2.1 replacement level.

Since 1909 the country has counted its babies — and today it isn't having enough to replace itself. U.S. births span the Baby Boom's 1957 peak, the long decline that followed, and today's fertility rate well below the replacement level of 2.1. That quiet shift ripples into the Social Security math, the immigration debate, housing, and the economy's future. This traces a century of births, what drives fertility down, how the U.S. compares globally, and why 'not enough babies' has become a live political theme.

Total fertility rate

1.60

2024 — record low, from 3.77 in 1957

Replacement level

2.1

births/woman to hold the population

Births per year

3.63M

vs ~4.3M at the 1957 Boom peak

Mean age at 1st birth

27.5

record high, up from 21.4 in 1970

Workers per retiree

2.7

down from 5.1 in 1960 (SSA)

The 116-year arc

The United States has counted its births every year since 1909. That century-long record contains three great movements: the long pre-war decline into the Great Depression floor of 1933, the explosive Baby Boom that peaked in 1957 at 4.3 million births and a total fertility rate of 3.77, and the long slide since — punctuated by an all-time-high birth count in 2007 (4.32 million) just before the Great Recession bent the curve down for good.

The raw number of births and the fertility rate tell different stories. America still records roughly 3.6 million births a year — not far below the Boom — but it does so with more than double the population of 1957. Adjust for that, and the general fertility rate has fallen from 122.9 in 1957 to 53.8 in 2024, less than half. The rate, not the count, is what drives everything downstream.

Births per year · U.S. · 1909–2024

Source: NCHS. 1909–2018 from the Births & General Fertility Rates series; 2019–2024 from Births: Final Data reports. Boom peak 4.30M (1957); all-time count high 4.32M (2007).

General fertility rate · births per 1,000 women 15–44

Source: NCHS. The rate strips out population growth — it has fallen from 122.9 (1957) to 53.8 (2024), the lowest on record.

Total fertility rate · births per woman · vs replacement

Source: published NCHS total fertility rates. Except for a brief return in 2006–07, U.S. TFR has run below the 2.1 replacement level every year since 1972. 2024 final: 1.599 — the lowest ever recorded.

A century of births · 1909 — present

Hover any milestone for context.

PeakPolicy / milestoneTrough / breakRecord low

The shaded band marks the 1946–1964 Baby Boom.