Why more older Koreans are ending marriages they once felt compelled to endure
Divorces among Koreans aged 60 and older reached a record last year as longer lives, adult children and demands for independence reshape late-life choices.
More married couples in their 60s and older in Korea are achieving something they waited decades for — a divorce.
A couple in Seoul ended their marriage earlier this year after being together for nearly 60 years.
“My client in her 80s told me that she had experienced her husband's delusional jealousy since she was young, but she put up with it because of their children,” Kwak Yoon-seo, a divorce attorney from law firm JR LLC, told the Korea JoongAng Daily. “She said that as her husband got older, it got worse — she couldn't even go out, and whenever she made a phone call, he would grill her about who she had been talking to. It kept happening repeatedly, and she reached her limit.”
The couple’s pursuit of a divorce is nothing unique, as the number of divorce cases among those aged 60 and above is rising and hit an all-time high last year at 13,743, according to the Ministry of Data and Statistics.
The rise in divorce among couples in their 60s and older reflects a departure from more conservative times, when married couples were expected to endure hardships to maintain their families.
Factors that may have prevented couples from pursuing divorce earlier in their marriage — such as having young children — become less relevant to couples after age 60, when many couples enter a stage of life with fewer family and financial responsibilities.
Less reason to care
Even when a couple is unhappy with their marriage due to lifestyle differences or other serious problems, ending the marriage is not so simple when young children are involved.
"The biggest reason couples delay their divorce is usually the children,” Song Young-eun, a divorce attorney from the law firm Law & Liberty, told the Korea JoongAng Daily. “When kids are young, divorce has such a significant impact on them that many people choose to stay in the marriage. But once their children reach adulthood, they think, 'I don't have any reason to keep enduring this anymore,' and that's when most of them decide to get divorced."
Some couples even opt to postpone their divorce until their kids get married, so that their children can avoid the stigma associated with having divorced parents.
“Many parents worry that their children's future in-laws may not welcome someone who grew up in a divorced family,” Song said.
When couples are in their 60s or older, divorces do not come with the burden of paying — or depending on — child support, as many kids are adults by then.
When a divorced parent without a full-time job is left with an underage child, child support may not be enough to raise their kid.
A mother carries her child in her arms in the Gwanghwamun area in central Seoul on Oct. 4, 2023.NEWS1
The biggest challenge one-parent households in Seoul experience is having to survive and pay for their kids’ education with only child support, according to a study released by the Seoul Foundation of Women and Family in 2025.
“Women often depend financially on their husbands. So when they consider divorce, they worry about how they'll support themselves,” Song said. “If they become the primary caregiver, they also wonder, 'Can I really raise my children on child support alone?' Those are some of the biggest concerns they have.”
Longer life expectancy, more divorces
Korea’s life expectancy had increased to 83.7 years as of 2024, nearly 20 years longer than in the 1970s, according to data from the Ministry of Data and Statistics last year.
For couples unhappy with their marriages, this means they have much more time to spend the rest of their lives discontented. And that is not what they want to do.
“When people realize that even after divorcing in their 60s, they still have another two or three decades ahead of them, they begin to think, ‘I want to spend the rest of my life living the way I want to,' and I think that desire becomes much stronger,” Song said.
Older adults spend time at a senior center in Dongjak District, southern Seoul, on April 25, 2022.YONHAP
Longer life expectancy can also create a circumstance in which couples spend more time together at home, especially when they retire at 60. This forces them to confront each other more often, which can lead to more conflicts and eventually divorce.
This phenomenon isn't limited to Korea. The same dynamic is at work in neighboring Japan, where more and more middle-aged people want divorces as average lifespans grow.
Many middle-aged Japanese couples seeking divorce reportedly say they do not want to spend the rest of their lives as the spouse of somebody they dislike.
Seeking freedom or a new partner
Reasons for divorce often differ between men and women.
For many women, marriage comes with responsibilities such as housework or child care, which limits their freedom to some extent. This may not be critical in the beginning of their marriage but becomes increasingly important to some as they age.
“Many women who divorce after decades of marriage have spent most of those years taking care of the household and raising their children,” Song said. “They devoted their lives to their families, but in the process, they became financially dependent on their husbands and felt they had little control over their own lives. I think a lot of them feel that, after everything they've done for their families, they shouldn't have ended up like this. That's one of the main reasons they choose to divorce.”
People rest at Tapgol Park in central Seoul on July 28.NEWS1
As for some men who choose divorce in their 60s, they do so to start a new life.
“Many men feel that they've spent their younger years devoted to their children and their wives,” Song said. “So after retirement, they think, 'I've done my part. Now I want to enjoy the rest of my life without feeling guilty toward my spouse, and I want the freedom to date someone else.' I think that's what some of them are looking for.”
Numbers in recent years suggest that finding a new partner is what a growing number of divorced men do, although reasons for doing so may vary.
A total of 6,326 divorced people aged 65 and older married in 2024, a 70 percent increase from 2015, according to the Ministry of Data and Statistics last year, with men accounting for a larger share at 3,896.
Challenges when older couples divorce
A divorce after turning 60 may be easier than it was 20 years ago, but not when it comes to property division.
The longer a marriage, the more property couples must divide.
“Once you've been married for several decades, you're dealing with much more property, so the disputes become incredibly intense,” Song said. “In Korea, the asset couples fight over the most is real estate.”
An apartment a couple purchased during their marriage, for example, may be subject to a 50-50 division if they divorce after 30 years of marriage.
The Supreme Court’s position is that property division is based on each spouse’s contributions not only to the acquisition but also to the preservation of assets. This also goes for pensions.
For the National Pension — Korea’s public pension system that provides financial support after retirement and into which employees at workplaces must enroll — an ex-spouse can claim a share of the pension based on the years they were married, with up to half of the amount available.
If a husband paid into the National Pension for 40 years and was married for 30 of those years, for example, his wife can claim a share of the pension from those 30 years. If he receives 2 million won ($1,400) per month, about 1.5 million won would be from the marriage period, so she could receive about 750,000 won.
A person walks out of a National Pension Service building in Seodaemun District, western Seoul, on April 8.NEWS1
For women who did not engage in paid employment and therefore did not enroll in the National Pension system, the division of pension benefits can become an important issue in the event of divorce. The share of people aged 60 and older receiving National Pension benefits stood at 55.4 percent for men and 41 percent for women as of April last year, according to a report by the National Pension Research Institute.
Division of these properties could thus present some difficulties when ending a marriage, but this has not stopped more and more older couples from cutting the knot.
The rise of divorce among older couples is not simply a result of disagreements over values or goals, but rather a reflection of the life couples have endured for decades.
