The resident population of the United States by sex, 1980 to 2025
The resident population of the United States has grown from about 227 million in 1980 to about 342 million in 2025, and across that span women have consistently outnumbered men. As of mid 2024, the most recent year with a finalized breakdown, there were about 168.3 million men and 171.8 million women, a difference of roughly 3.4 million in favor of women.
The story of the last four decades is not the female majority itself, which dates back to 1950, but how slowly it has been eroding. The chart below sets the male and female populations side by side at each census from 1980 to 2020, plus the latest 2024 estimate, and the two bars have crept closer together over time. The detail behind that convergence, the sex ratio, the shrinking gap and the role of longer female lifespans, runs through the rest of this report.
A note on the data. Every figure comes from the U.S. Census Bureau. The years 1980 through 2020 use the decennial census, while 2024 uses the annual population estimate. The 2025 total is a Census estimate; the full 2025 split by sex has not yet been finalized, so the latest exact male and female counts shown here are for 2024.
Women lead, but the gap is closing: the female population has topped the male count in every year shown, though the two are converging.
How much has the US population grown since 1980?
The total resident population climbed almost every single year, from about 227 million in 1980 to 250 million by 1990, 282 million by 2000, 309 million by 2010, 332 million by 2020 and roughly 342 million by 2025. That is an increase of more than 115 million people in 45 years, or about 51 percent, even as annual growth has cooled markedly in the most recent years.
Two forces drive the total: natural increase, meaning births minus deaths, and net immigration. As birth rates have fallen, immigration has become the larger contributor, which is also part of the reason the male and female counts have moved closer together. The broader context for this national trend sits within the wider world population picture, where the United States remains the third most populous country.
The area chart below traces the total for every year from 1980 to 2025. The line keeps rising, but the slope flattens after 2020, a visual hint of the slowdown that later sections break down decade by decade.
Up more than half since 1980: the population rose from about 227 million in 1980 to about 342 million in 2025, adding over 115 million people.
Are there more men or women in the United States?
There are more women than men, and there have been since 1950. In 2024 women led by about 3.4 million. What has changed is the size of that lead. Measured as the sex ratio, the number of men per 100 women, the balance stood at just 94.5 in 1980, meaning a sizeable female majority, and has climbed steadily to about 98 in 2024. A ratio moving toward 100 means the two sexes are approaching parity.
The gap in raw numbers tells the same story with a twist. The surplus of women held between five and six million for decades, dipped toward five million around 2010, edged back up near six million by 2020, then fell sharply to about 3.4 million by 2024. The recent narrowing is the fastest on record and is driven largely by immigration, which has skewed male in recent years. Our deeper US population by gender coverage tracks these annual movements in more detail.
The first chart below shows the sex ratio rising across the decades, and the second shows how many more women than men there were at each point. Read together, they capture a female majority that is real but slowly fading.
Creeping back toward balance: the sex ratio rose from 94.5 men per 100 women in 1980 to about 98 in 2024.
A shrinking surplus: women outnumbered men by five to six million for decades, then the gap fell to about 3.4 million by 2024.
What share of the US population is female?
Women made up about 50.5 percent of the resident population in 2024, down from 51.4 percent in 1980. It is a slight majority that has held for generations, but the female share has ticked down by nearly a full percentage point over 45 years as the male and female counts converged.
That slow decline in the female share is the mirror image of the rising sex ratio. It reflects two long-running shifts: a gradual narrowing of the gap between male and female life expectancy through the late twentieth century, and more recently an inflow of immigrants that has leaned male. Neither has flipped the balance, but together they have trimmed the female edge year after year.
The line chart below shows the female share of the population easing from just above 51 percent toward 50.5 percent. Small as the movement looks, across a population of more than 340 million each tenth of a percentage point represents hundreds of thousands of people.
A slight, slowly fading majority: the female share eased from 51.4 percent in 1980 to about 50.5 percent in 2024.
Why do women outnumber men in the US?
The answer lies in the interplay of birth and death. Boys are actually born more often than girls, at roughly 105 male births for every 100 female births, so among children and young adults men are in the majority. Women take the lead only later in life, because they live longer on average. US life expectancy in 2024 was about 81.4 years for women against 76.5 years for men, a gap of nearly five years.
That longevity difference reshapes the population by age. Among people aged 65 and over there are only about 82 men per 100 women, and the imbalance widens further among the oldest groups. Because older cohorts are large and growing, this late-life surplus of women is enough to tip the entire national balance toward females even though boys start out ahead.
The chart below shows the sex ratio by broad age group. It runs above 100, more men than women, in youth and working age, then falls sharply after 65. This single picture explains why a country that is majority male at birth ends up majority female overall.
Men lead young, women lead old: the ratio tops 100 through working age, then falls to about 82 among those 65 and over.
Is US population growth slowing down?
Yes, and sharply. Each decade from the 1980s through the 2010s added between 22 and 33 million people, with the 1990s the fastest at about 32.7 million. The five years from 2020 to 2025 added only around 10 million, which on a per-year basis is the slowest sustained growth in modern US history.
The slowdown reflects a falling birth rate, an aging population and, in some recent years, higher deaths. Immigration has become the main thing keeping growth positive at all. The waterfall chart below shows how many people were added in each period, building from the 1980 base up to the 2025 total, and the final block is visibly the shortest.
Measured as a growth rate the pattern is just as clear: the population grew 9.8 percent in the 1980s, peaked at 13.2 percent in the 1990s, then eased to 9.7, 7.4 and about 3.1 percent for the partial 2020 to 2025 period. The second chart puts those rates side by side.
The 2020s are lagging: only about 10 million people were added from 2020 to 2025, well below every earlier decade.
Cooling since the 1990s: decade growth fell from a 13.2 percent peak to about 3.1 percent for the partial 2020 to 2025 span.
Is the gender gap closing, and why?
Since 1980 the male population has grown slightly faster than the female population. Indexed to 1980, the number of men reached about 153 by 2024 while the number of women reached about 148, meaning men grew roughly 53 percent against 47 percent for women. That small difference, compounded over four decades, is what has pulled the sex ratio up toward balance.
The main reason is immigration. Migrant flows into the United States have tended to include more men than women, particularly in working-age groups, adding proportionally more men to the total. A gradual narrowing of the life-expectancy gap earlier in the period played a supporting role. The technology and labor shifts reshaping who moves where are visible across our wider economic coverage too.
The chart below indexes the male and female populations to 100 in 1980 so their growth paths can be compared directly. The two lines start together and slowly separate, with the male line edging above, a compact picture of why the female majority keeps shrinking.
Men grew a little faster: since 1980 the male population is up about 53 percent against 47 percent for women.
The latest US population split by sex
The most recent finalized breakdown, for mid 2024, put the resident population at about 168.3 million men and 171.8 million women, a female share of roughly 50.5 percent. It is the closest the two have been in the modern record, and if current trends hold the gap will keep narrowing.
That near-even split at the national level hides wide variation underneath, by age as shown earlier and by state, with some states leaning male and most leaning female. The donut below shows the simple national picture as it stood in 2024.
Close to an even split: 171.8 million women and 168.3 million men, about 50.5 percent female.
US population by sex in numbers
A few figures sum up 45 years of change. The population grew by more than 115 million, women stayed in the majority throughout, the surplus of women fell to about 3.4 million, and the sex ratio climbed from 94.5 to about 98 men per 100 women. The direction of travel is a slow return toward balance.
These numbers matter because the balance of men and women shapes everything from the labor force to health care and retirement planning. A slowly aging, slowly balancing population sets the backdrop for the decades ahead.
US population by sex: the big picture
Across 45 years the United States added more than 115 million residents and kept a female majority the whole time, yet the underlying trend is one of convergence. The sex ratio has climbed toward 100, the surplus of women has shrunk to its smallest in the modern record, and the female share has eased below 51 percent, all driven by longer male lifespans and male-skewed immigration.
Looking ahead, a slowing overall growth rate and continued immigration suggest the two sexes will remain close to parity in the aggregate, even as women continue to dominate the oldest age groups. For readers tracking how the country is changing, the detailed year-by-year movements are covered in our US population by gender data, set within the broader world population context.
Frequently Asked Questions: US Population by Sex
As of mid 2024 there were about 168.3 million men and 171.8 million women living in the United States, out of a resident population of roughly 340 million. The total reached about 342 million by mid 2025.
Women have outnumbered men in every census since 1950. In 2024 there were about 3.4 million more women than men, a gap that has narrowed sharply from more than 6 million around 2020.
The sex ratio was about 98 men per 100 women in 2024, up from 94.5 in 1980. The long rise means the female majority has been slowly shrinking over four decades.
Women made up about 50.5 percent of the resident population in 2024, down from 51.4 percent in 1980. Females have been a slight majority since the middle of the twentieth century.
Boys are born slightly more often than girls, but women live longer, so they come to outnumber men in older age groups. At age 65 and over there are only about 82 men per 100 women, which pulls the overall balance toward women.
The resident population grew from about 227 million in 1980 to roughly 342 million in 2025, an increase of more than 115 million people or about 51 percent in 45 years.
Yes. Each decade from the 1980s through the 2010s added between 22 and 33 million people, but only about 10 million were added between 2020 and 2025, one of the slowest stretches in modern history.
The male population has grown slightly faster than the female population since 1980, up about 53 percent against 47 percent, driven partly by male-skewed immigration. That is why the sex ratio keeps rising toward balance.
The resident population is the US Census Bureau standard and includes everyone living in the 50 states and the District of Columbia, regardless of citizenship, but excludes Americans living abroad.
All figures come from the US Census Bureau, using the decennial censuses for 1980 through 2020 and the annual population estimates for the most recent years.
U.S. Census Bureau - Decennial censuses 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010 and 2020, resident population by sex.
U.S. Census Bureau - Population estimates program, annual national estimates by sex through 2024 and total to 2025.
U.S. Census Bureau and CIA World Factbook - Sex ratio by age group and life expectancy by sex.
United States Census Bureau - Primary source for all population figures.