Solicitor
Beecham Peacock Solicitors
In 2022, it was revealed that Birkenhead was the #1 area searching for divorce in the UK from September 2019 to September 2020 – a unique period when marital bonds were challenged throughout the COVID lockdown.
The findings were collated using Google keyword data, finding the area in the UK where the highest number of people are searching for divorce information. Topping the list was the likes of Birkenhead, Birmingham and Bradford.
Fast-forward two years, the UK’s social and political landscape is once again almost unrecognisable: two new Prime Ministers, social tensions over foreign wars, eco-anxiety, recession and a ravaging cost-of-living crisis have all contributed to the national stress.
With one in five of us experiencing stress every single day, we wanted to see how this stress was yet again impacting the UK’s love life – returning to the Newcastle family law specialists at Beecham Peacock Solicitors for their analysis of the latest findings from July 2023 to June 2024.
Key findings:
- Plymouth is now the UK’s #1 hotspot for divorce.
- Birkenhead has been demoted, now sitting at the third-highest divorce hotspot.
- January is the most common month that people search for a divorce.
- Kingston-Upon-Hull has the highest year-on-year increase for divorce searches.
The heartbreak cities:
Using data from Google’s Keyword Planner tool, Beecham Peacock has identified how many people are searching for divorce in each city, using this data to find the cities with the leading number of searches every month for “divorce” per 100,000 people.
- Plymouth – 27.77 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Portsmouth – 26.89 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Birkenhead – 22.87 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Leeds – 22.06 monthly searches per 100,000 people
- Bradford – 21.11 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Bristol – 16.25 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Leicester – 15.4 monthly searches per 100,000 people
- Belfast – 13.11 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Hull – 13.02 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Birmingham – 11.53 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- London – 11.16 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Manchester – 9.84 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Liverpool – 8.09 monthly searches per 100,000 people.
- Glasgow – 7.14 monthly searches per 100,000 people
- Edinburgh – 3.26 monthly searches per 100,000 people
The findings:
Birkenhead will be happy to hear that it has been dethroned as the #1 UK hotspot for divorce, being succeeded by Plymouth at #1 and Portsmouth at #2 with 27.77 searches per 100k people and 26.89 searches per 100k respectively.
Plymouth saw the largest increase in the top three, with monthly searches for ‘divorce’ increasing by 143% year-on-year since 2023. Searches in Birkenhead saw a notable 75% increase, after recovering slightly in 2023 with 16.33 searches per 100,000 people. Searches in Portsmouth increased slightly since the previous year also, rising by 22%.
Shock results: Hull & the New Year
Most shocking of all in the data provided by Beecham Peacock is the year-on-year increase of Kingston-Upon-Hull and the average month in which divorce is searched across all cities.
Hull saw the largest year-on-year increase in monthly searches for ‘divorce’ out of all of the cities analysed. Here, searches rose by 350% since 2023 – that’s over double the increase of Portsmouth, which saw the second-highest year-on-year increase of 143%.
Additionally, Beecham Peacock has found that January is the most common month in which we see an increase in searches for divorce.
The areas which saw the highest search increases in January were more likely to have higher total searches per 100,000 people, suggesting that January is the breaking point for most considering a divorce.
A closer look at the data reveals a pattern of searches rising the most in months outside of spring and summer. Searches peak in months starting from August (the end of summer) through to January (the peak of winter), with the extreme of the peak rising the further into winter we get.
Do more couples separate in winter?
An influential study by Professor Julie Brines in 2016 found that divorce is in fact seasonal, with most breakups happening in winter and official divorce filings happening a couple of months later into the new year.
This is due to numerous factors, including the pressure of the holiday season to be happy and family-oriented, leading couples to a realisation that their relationships have fallen flat.
This theory lines up with Beecham Peacock’s findings, especially in relation to the peak of ‘divorce’ Google searches in January – immediately after the festive holidays. It seems January acts as the investigation stage into filing for divorce, with the official separation taking place in the coming months.
“Divorce can be a daunting and incredibly stressful life change,” says Lauren Laverick, divorce solicitor at Beecham Peacock. “We understand taking that first step takes a lot of courage, and the quicker a divorce can be processed, the sooner couples can begin to heal amicably. A considerate and understanding approach to divorce proceedings is paramount, so we hope the people of Plymouth are confident that they are being represented with their best interests at heart.”
Read more articles by Beecham Peacock Solicitors.
About Beecham Peacock
Established in 1953, Beecham Peacock is one of the North East’s leading law firms with a wealth of experience in a myriad of different legal fields. Its team of expert solicitors includes specialists in wills, trusts and probate, personal injury, family law and employment law. The firm also offers a wide range of other legal services.