Women are leading the way when it comes to same-sex weddings in Australia.
More than half of the 3149 same-sex marriages during the first six months following federal parliament's amendments to the Marriage Act last December were registered by women, the Australian Bureau of Statistics says.
While same-sex marriages were officially allowed from January 9 this year, a handful of couples were given special permission to tie the knot just days after the laws were amended.
"Same-sex female couples were more eager to wed following amendments to Australia's marriage laws, with 1773 (56.3 per cent) registered by 30 June 2018, compared to 1376 (43.7 per cent) male same-sex couples," the ABS said.
Civil marriage ceremonies strongly outnumbered religious ones, with civil celebrants officiating at 99 per cent of the weddings.
March turned out to be the most popular month for same-sex marriages, with 717 weddings.
However Saturday April 21 was the most popular single day to tie the knot.
And the most popular state? NSW, where 1090 couples said "I do".
More than 80 per cent of the brides and grooms had never been married before.
There was also a bit of an age gap between the sexes, with the median age of men involved in same-sex marriages coming in at 48.5 years while for women it was 39.
The figures were part of the first batch of national data released by the ABS on same sex marriage since the laws were changed.
The release was part of a wider set of figures on all marriages and divorces for 2017.
While same-sex couples have been rushing to the altar, the number of all marriages registered actually fell 4.7 per cent to 112,954 during the year.
However for the first time, the age women marry has nudged above 30, up from 29.3 years a decade ago.
For men, the median age was 32 years, compared to 31.6 years in 2007.
Meanwhile, divorces have risen five per cent to 49,032.
Queensland continued to have the highest divorce rate - 2.3 divorces per 1,000 people - while the Northern Territory had the lowest at 1.6 per 1000.
