Gen Z singles haven’t given up on marriage. Match Group reported that 72% of Gen Z respondents in its 2026 Singles in America study want to get married, the highest share among the generations it compared.
“For a generation told to keep things casual and see where they go, saying you want marriage can almost feel countercultural,” Lauren DeFord, director of brand marketing at Match Group, said in the company’s announcement about its Upward dating app.
That is an encouraging finding for families who wonder whether young adults still see a future in lifelong commitment. But the distinction matters: hoping to marry someday is not the same as getting married, and this survey does not speak for every young American.
Match funded the study in partnership with researchers at Indiana University’s Kinsey Institute. According to its Sept. 10 research announcement, researchers surveyed approximately 5,000 US adults online between March and April 2026, defining Gen Z as ages 18–29.
Participants were not married, living with a partner, in a domestic partnership or in a committed relationship. In other words, the comparison concerns singles at different stages of life, not all members of each generation, including those already married.
The university’s 344-page public codebook makes the central question straightforward: respondents answered whether they wanted to get married in the future. Across the full sample, 44.6% said yes, 29.1% said no and 26.3% did not know.
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Those are personal hopes, not a vote on whether marriage is good for society. The codebook lists 1,543 Gen Z participants, but does not provide the marriage answers broken down by generation; the 72% figure and generational ranking come from Match’s announcement.
There is another useful caution in the institute’s methodology explanation: participants come from opt-in research panels, not Match’s customer lists. Researchers describe the sample as demographically representative, not a probability sample that randomly selects people from the population.
Still, the broader findings offer a hopeful picture of what singles value. Match reports that 76% across all age groups believe romantic love can last forever, while 49% have fallen for someone they did not initially find attractive.
Among the reasons attraction grew, respondents cited good conversation, shared interests and shared values. Those findings cover singles across age groups, not Gen Z alone, but they leave room for something less hurried than judging a potential spouse at first glance.
Match has a business interest in that outlook, too. Its Sept. 22 Upward relaunch puts marriage intentions front and center, including a feature that lets users share when they hope to marry.
“Wanting to get married at 24 and actually getting married by 30 are two very different things,” Val Klimov, founder of the dating app Fledge, told Newsweek.
For Christian parents, the opportunity is practical: talk honestly about commitment, model faithfulness and help young adults think beyond the wedding day. These findings give families reason to listen to young singles’ hopes, without pretending a survey can tell us how their love stories will end.
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