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


The cities in Massachusetts with the highest divorce rate are Palmer Town and Southbridge Town for 2023 based on Saturday Night Science.

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

  • The city with the highest divorce rate in Massachusetts is Palmer Town based on the most recent Census data.

  • Palmer Town is 14.0% Divorced.

  • The city with the lowest divorce rate in Massachusetts is Cambridge.

  • Cambridge is 1.0% Divorced.

  • Massachusetts is 5.0% Divorced.


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


There are some 279,674 people living in Massachusetts 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 Bay 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 Massachusetts with the highest rates of divorcees.

The 10 Cities In Massachusetts With The Highest Divorce Rates

  1. Palmer Town
  2. Southbridge Town
  3. North Adams
  4. Gardner
  5. Attleboro
  6. Gloucester
  7. Winthrop Town
  8. Weymouth Town
  9. Taunton
  10. Haverhill

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

What is the city in Massachusetts with the highest divorce rate? That would be Palmer Town, with 14.0% of people over 15 years of age being divorced, per the most recent census data.

What is the overall Massachusetts divorce rate? According to the 2017-2021 Community Survey, the overall divorce rate in Massachusetts is 5.0%, which compares to the US divorce rate of 10.9%.

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

For more Massachusetts reading, check out:

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

Palmer Town, MA

Source: Wikipedia User John Phelan | CC BY 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 12,434
Divorce Rate: 14.0%
Divorcees: 1,392
Median Income: $70,090
More on Palmer Town: Data | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Southbridge Town, MA

Source: Wikipedia User John Phelan | CC BY 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 17,643
Divorce Rate: 10.0%
Divorcees: 1,411
Median Income: $50,414
More on Southbridge Town: Data | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

North Adams, MA

Source: Wikipedia User Beyond My Ken | GFDL
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 13,024
Divorce Rate: 10.0%
Divorcees: 1,041
Median Income: $48,575
More on North Adams: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Gardner, MA

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

5
/10

Population: 21,183
Divorce Rate: 10.0%
Divorcees: 1,694
Median Income: $52,770
More on Gardner: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Attleboro, MA

Source: Wikipedia User Daniel Case | GFDL
Overall SnackAbility

8.5
/10

Population: 46,146
Divorce Rate: 9.0%
Divorcees: 3,322
Median Income: $81,627
More on Attleboro: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Gloucester, MA

Source: Wikipedia User Paul Keleher from Mass, US | CC BY 2.0
Overall SnackAbility

8.5
/10

Population: 29,814
Divorce Rate: 9.0%
Divorcees: 2,146
Median Income: $82,984
More on Gloucester: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Source: Public Domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 19,088
Divorce Rate: 9.0%
Divorcees: 1,374
Median Income: $86,780
More on Winthrop Town: Data | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Source: Public Domain
Overall SnackAbility

6
/10

Population: 57,217
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 3,661
Median Income: $91,592
More on Weymouth Town: Data | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Taunton, MA

Source: Public domain
Overall SnackAbility

8
/10

Population: 59,076
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 3,780
Median Income: $66,787
More on Taunton: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

Haverhill, MA

Source: Wikipedia User Fletcher6 | CC BY-SA 3.0
Overall SnackAbility

8
/10

Population: 67,093
Divorce Rate: 8.0%
Divorcees: 4,293
Median Income: $75,130
More on Haverhill: Data | Crime | Cost Of Living | Real Estate

How We Determined The Places In Massachusetts 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 52 places in Massachusetts with a population of over 12,000.

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

And if you’re trying to avoid divorce, check out Cambridge, the city with the lowest divorce rate in Massachusetts.

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

Getting Some Closure In Massachusetts After Untying The Know

Besides just coming up with what we thought would be a great new blog/book title, “Untying the Knot In Massachusetts: Life After Divorce,” we now have a sense of what places in the Bay 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 Massachusetts 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 Massachusetts reading, check out:

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

Rank City Divorce Rate
1 Palmer Town, MA 14.0%
2 Southbridge Town, MA 10.0%
3 North Adams, MA 10.0%
4 Gardner, MA 10.0%
5 Attleboro, MA 9.0%
6 Gloucester, MA 9.0%
7 Winthrop Town, MA 9.0%
8 Weymouth Town, MA 8.0%
9 Taunton, MA 8.0%
10 Haverhill, MA 8.0%
11 Chicopee, MA 8.0%
12 Leominster, MA 8.0%
13 Amesbury Town, MA 8.0%
14 Fitchburg, MA 8.0%
15 Pittsfield, MA 8.0%
16 New Bedford, MA 7.0%
17 Newburyport, MA 7.0%
18 Agawam Town, MA 7.0%
19 Salem, MA 7.0%
20 West Springfield Town, MA 7.0%
21 Westfield, MA 7.0%
22 Peabody, MA 7.0%
23 Woburn, MA 7.0%
24 Marlborough, MA 7.0%
25 Beverly, MA 7.0%
26 Easthampton Town, MA 7.0%
27 Fall River, MA 7.0%
28 Worcester, MA 6.0%
29 Barnstable Town, MA 6.0%
30 Braintree Town, MA 6.0%
31 Methuen Town, MA 6.0%
32 Lynn, MA 6.0%
33 Brockton, MA 5.0%
34 Revere, MA 5.0%
35 Quincy, MA 5.0%
36 Lowell, MA 5.0%
37 Holyoke, MA 5.0%
38 Northampton, MA 5.0%
39 Everett, MA 4.0%
40 Franklin Town, MA 4.0%
41 Melrose, MA 4.0%
42 Springfield, MA 4.0%
43 Medford, MA 3.0%
44 Watertown Town, MA 3.0%
45 Malden, MA 3.0%
46 Waltham, MA 3.0%
47 Somerville, MA 2.0%
48 Boston, MA 2.0%
49 Chelsea, MA 2.0%
50 Newton, MA 2.0%
51 Lawrence, MA 2.0%
52 Cambridge, MA 1.0%