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What's the ideal age to reach a life milestone? Many Americans say it depends

By Manuela López Restrepo
Published March 21, 2025 at 5:50 PM EDT
On average, the Americans surveyed by Pew said the best age to become a parent is 27.3 years old.
Richard Drury
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Getty Images
On average, the Americans surveyed by Pew said the best age to become a parent is 27.3 years old.

What do you consider a life milestone?

Maybe it's buying a home, starting a family or finally finishing that manuscript you've been working on.

A new survey from the Pew Research Center released Wednesday sought to find out what Americans think are the ideal times for some of those traditional milestones to take place. Spoiler alert: it depends!

Three things to know:
  1. In April of last year, Pew asked 3,600 U.S. adults what they would consider to be the ideal ages for getting married, having a first child, buying a home and retiring.
  2. On average, the people surveyed say that the best age to get married is 26.5; the best age to become a parent is 27.3; the best age to purchase a home is 28.8; and the best age to retire is 61.8.
  3. But! A significant portion of each group also said that there was actually no ideal age for any of these milestones. Half of respondents said there's no best age to get married or purchase a home; four in 10 said there was no best age to have children; and a third said there was no ideal retirement age.

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A shift from previous generations

These averages are reflective of a larger cultural trend among younger Americans — they're hitting these milestones later in life than previous generations, according to a Pew analysis from 2023.

The study, which looked at Census Bureau data, showed that adults under 21 were hitting major life milestones later than adults from 40 years prior.

That tracks with the most recent census data, which says the median age for first-time marriage in 2024 was 30.2 years for men and 28.6 years for women. In 1974, those respective ages were 23.1 and 21.1.

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Manuela López Restrepo
Manuela López Restrepo is a producer and writer at All Things Considered. She's been at NPR since graduating from The University of Maryland, and has worked at shows like Morning Edition and It's Been A Minute. She lives in Brooklyn with her cat Martin.

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