The 10 Cities In Maryland With The Highest Divorce Rates For 2023


The cities in Maryland with the highest divorce rate are Hampstead and Cumberland for 2023 based on Saturday Night Science.

Cities with highest divorce rate in Maryland research summary. We analyzed Maryland’s most recent Census data to determine the divorce rate for each city in Maryland based on the percentage of currently divorced residents. Here are the results of our analysis:

  • The city with the highest divorce rate in Maryland is Hampstead based on the most recent Census data.

  • Hampstead is 11.0% Divorced.

  • The city with the lowest divorce rate in Maryland is District Heights.

  • District Heights is 0.0% Divorced.

  • Maryland is 4.0% Divorced.


Table Of Contents: Top Ten | Methodology | Summary | Table


There are some 196,753 people living in Maryland over fifteen years of age who are divorced. You can compare that to the 28,339,199 Americans who are currently divorced in 2023.

Many people decide to run away – or split up – across the Old Line State.

Isn’t the divorce rate in America close to 50%? Yes indeed. But we’re measuring something else; we are looking at counts and percentages of people over 15 years old who are currently divorced. That 50% statistic is for the percentage of people who have ever been divorced.

For today’s analysis, the focus will be on the number of currently divorced people.

So now that we have you biting your nails, rethinking your worldview, and pulling out your hair, let’s look at the places in Maryland with the highest rates of divorcees.

The 10 Cities In Maryland With The Highest Divorce Rates

  1. Hampstead
  2. Cumberland
  3. Cambridge
  4. Ocean City
  5. Hagerstown
  6. Frostburg
  7. Bel Air
  8. Cheste
  9. Baltimore
  10. Thurmont

Let’s quickly recap before we dive into the Saturday Night Science behind the data.

What is the city in Maryland with the highest divorce rate? That would be Hampstead, with 11.0% of people over 15 years of age being divorced, per the most recent census data.

What is the overall Maryland divorce rate? According to the 2017-2021 Community Survey, the overall divorce rate in Maryland is 4.0%, which compares to the US divorce rate of 10.9%.

Alrighty, on to how we calculated the places with the highest divorce rates in Maryland.

For more Maryland reading, check out:

The 10 Places With The Highest Divorce Rate In Maryland For 2023

Hampstead, MD

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 6,273
Divorce Rate: 11.0%
Divorcees: 552
Median Income: $80,385
More on Hampstead: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Cumberland, MD

Source: Wikipedia User 0915426A | CC BY-SA 4.0
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 19,028
Divorce Rate: 11.0%
Divorcees: 1,674
Median Income: $43,699
More on Cumberland: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Cambridge, MD

Source: Wikipedia User FlickreviewR | CC BY-SA 2.0
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 13,026
Divorce Rate: 10.0%
Divorcees: 1,042
Median Income: $40,094
More on Cambridge: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Ocean City, MD

Source: Wikipedia User . The original uploader was Xiaphias at English Wikipedia | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

7
/10

Population: 6,869
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 439
Median Income: $58,563
More on Ocean City: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Hagerstown, MD

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 43,015
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 2,752
Median Income: $42,965
More on Hagerstown: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Frostburg, MD

Source: Wikipedia User Lee Cannon from Bayville aka West Fenwick, DE, USA | CC BY-SA 2.0
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 7,282
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 466
Median Income: $44,327
More on Frostburg: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Bel Air, MD

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 10,663
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 682
Median Income: $64,036
More on Bel Air: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Source: Public Domain
Overall SnackAbility

7
/10

Population: 5,557
Divorce Rate: 7.0%
Divorcees: 311
Median Income: $44,665
More on Cheste: Data | Real Estate

Baltimore, MD

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 592,211
Divorce Rate: 7.0%
Divorcees: 33,163
Median Income: $54,124
More on Baltimore: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Thurmont, MD

Source: Wikipedia User Andrew Bain | GFDL
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 6,247
Divorce Rate: 6.0%
Divorcees: 299
Median Income: $82,098
More on Thurmont: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

How We Determined The Places In Maryland That Get Un-Hitched The Most

Since this is the 58th category of rankings we are compiling for the site, we had a pretty good idea of where to find data on marriage and divorce in America — the U.S. Census Bureau. Because who likes tracking misery more than the U.S. government?

Specifically, we looked at the 2017-2021 American Community Survey table S1201 — Marital Status.

Pretty straightforward on that front — we just had to extract the following column of data:

  • Population 15 Years and Over -> Divorced

There are some interesting/fun/sad data like .1% of female Americans aged 15-19 are divorced, but 0% of males (That’s probably a rounding issue, but still).

But the national data is for another day. Today, the analysis focuses on the 42 places in Maryland with a population of over 5,000.

We ranked each place by the percentage of divorcees over 15 years of age from highest to lowest. We crowned the divorce capital of Maryland the place with the highest incidence of divorcees, Hampstead.

And if you’re trying to avoid divorce, check out District Heights, the city with the lowest divorce rate in Maryland.

We updated this article for 2023 and this is our fifth time ranking the cities in Maryland with the highest divorce rates.

Getting Some Closure In Maryland After Untying The Know

Besides just coming up with what we thought would be a great new blog/book title, “Untying the Knot In Maryland: Life After Divorce,” we now have a sense of what places in the Old Line State don’t pay much attention to the whole “’til death do we part” phrase.

Try to keep in mind that the reason cities rank where they do in Maryland could be because of the age, education, and income distribution, as all of those things impact the rate of divorce.

And that’s probably for the best. Getting out of a toxic relationship is much better than staying in it.

Just make sure you have your running shoes ready to go.

For more Maryland reading, check out:

Detailed List Of The Cities With The Highest Divorce Rates In Maryland

Rank City Divorce Rate
1 Hampstead, MD 11.0%
2 Cumberland, MD 11.0%
3 Cambridge, MD 10.0%
4 Ocean City, MD 8.0%
5 Hagerstown, MD 8.0%
6 Frostburg, MD 8.0%
7 Bel Air, MD 8.0%
8 Cheste, MD 7.0%
9 Baltimore, MD 7.0%
10 Thurmont, MD 6.0%
11 Taneytown, MD 6.0%
12 Westminster, MD 6.0%
13 Salisbury, MD 5.0%
14 Manchester, MD 5.0%
15 Havre De Grace, MD 5.0%
16 Annapolis, MD 5.0%
17 Easton, MD 5.0%
18 Elkton, MD 5.0%
19 Aberdeen, MD 4.0%
20 Brunswick, MD 4.0%
21 Walkersville, MD 3.0%
22 Frederick, MD 3.0%
23 La Plata, MD 3.0%
24 Greenbelt, MD 2.0%
25 Bladensburg, MD 2.0%
26 Bowie, MD 2.0%
27 Laurel, MD 2.0%
28 Cheverly, MD 2.0%
29 Mount Airy, MD 2.0%
30 Riverdale Park, MD 2.0%
31 Chesapeake Beach, MD 2.0%
32 Gaithersburg, MD 1.0%
33 Rockville, MD 1.0%
34 Mount Rainier, MD 1.0%
35 New Carrollton, MD 1.0%
36 Fruitland, MD 1.0%
37 Hyattsville, MD 1.0%
38 College Park, MD 1.0%
39 Poolesville, MD 1.0%
40 Glenarden, MD 1.0%
41 Takoma Park, MD 0.0%
42 District Heights, MD 0.0%