The Netherlands was the first country to legalize same-sex marriage in 2001. Since then, almost 40 other countries have followed suit.
You can see this in the chart, based on data from Pew Research. By 2025, same-sex marriage was legal in 39 countries.
Last year, two countries were added to the total. Thailand became the first country in Southeast Asia to legalize same-sex marriage, and a same-sex marriage bill also took effect in Liechtenstein.
by ourworldindata
9 Comments
Data source: Pew Research Center 2025
Tools used: The OWID-Grapher and Figma
That’s actually lower than I thought it was. There’s almost 200 countries depending on how you count. Looking at the map on the linked page shows that it’s mostly the Western Hemisphere and Europe. The divide between countries that have legalized it and those that haven’t is basically just two halves rather than something like a checker board.
Aren’t there like 191 countries or so?
How are we only in *almost* 40 legalized countries? God damn…
That’s pitiful. Imagine if it said, “Almost 40 countries have given women the right to vote”
Always shocked when I see that no other countries is SE Asia have same-sex marriage or even that Thailand took this long
I thought Taiwan was the first country to do so?
While we still have a long way to go, I still think it’s pretty impressive that this has happened in my lifetime.
I’m a Millennial and it seems crazy now that it *wasn’t* legalised in places like western Europe when I was born.
Isn’t a line graph technically the wrong way to show this?
So what, in late 2000 there were 0.5 countries with legal gay marriage?
This will likely peak and reverse as demographics deteriorate.