
Birth Data

In the United States, State laws require birth certificates to be completed for all births, and Federal law mandates national collection and publication of births and other vital statistics data. The National Vital Statistics System, the Federal compilation of this data, is the result of the cooperation between the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS) and the States to provide access to statistical information from birth certificates.
Standard forms for the collection of the data and model procedures for the uniform registration of the events are developed and recommended for State use through cooperative activities of the States and NCHS. Material is available to assist persons in completing the death certificate. NCHS shares the costs incurred by the States in providing vital statistics data for national use.
Data for United States in 2020
- Number of births: 3,613,647
- Birth rate: 11.0 per 1,000 population
- Fertility rate: 56.0 births per 1000 women aged 15-44 years
- Prenatal care initiated in the 1st trimester: 77.7%
- Percent born preterm (less than 37 completed weeks of gestation): 10.09%
- Percent cesarean delivery: 31.8%
- Medicaid as source of payment for the delivery: 42.0%
Source: Births: Final Data for 2020 (Forthcoming)
Webinar
Publications
- Changes in Births by Month: United States, 2021 [PDF – 692 KB] (7/19/2022)
- Trends and Characteristics in Gestational Diabetes: United States, 2016–2020 [PDF – 774 KB] (7/19/2022)
- Births: Provisional Data for 2021 [PDF – 454 KB] (5/24/2022)
- Changes in Births by Month: United States, January 2019–June 2021 [PDF – 572 KB] (3/1/2022)
- Births: Final Data for 2020 [PDF – 1 MB] Supplemental Tables [PDF – 681 KB] (2/7/2021)
- Exploring the Decline in the Singleton Preterm Birth Rate in the United States, 2019–2020 (1/21/2021)
- Maternal and Infant Characteristics and Outcomes Among Women With Confirmed or Presumed COVID-19 During Pregnancy: 14 States and the District of Columbia [PDF – 817 KB] (12/29/2021)
- Prepregnancy Body Mass Index and Infant Outcomes by Race and Hispanic Origin: United States, 2020 [PDF – 364 KB] (12/28/2021)
- Changes in Home Births by Race and Hispanic Origin and State of Residence of Mother: United States, 2018–2019 and 2019–2020 [PDF – 698 KB] (12/9/2021)
- Births in the United States, 2020 (9/27/2021)
- Total Fertility Rates, by Maternal Educational Attainment and Race and Hispanic Origin: United States, 2019 [PDF – 237 KB] (5/12/2021)
- Changes in Births to New York City Residents Occurring Outside New York City, by Race and Hispanic Origin of the Mother: 2018–2019 and 2019–2020 [PDF – 364 KB] (5/5/2021)
- Births: Provisional Data for 2020 [PDF – 391 KB] (5/5/2021)
Public Use Data
- 2019 Birth Data Files (10/9/2020)