New figures released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) show that 2017 saw a significant drop in the number of same-sex marriages in Ireland.

In 2016, which was the first full year of same-sex marriages in Ireland and 1,056 same-sex marriages took place.

In 2017 there was a significant drop in this number with 759 marriages taking place across Ireland.

Of those you tied the knot, 424 were male unions and 335 were female unions. The average age of couples in same-sex marriages in 2017 was 40.4 years.

Over 69% of same-sex couples have civil marriage ceremonies.

The most popular form of ceremony for same-sex marriage celebrations was civil marriage ceremonies, which accounted for 527 marriages (69.4%) followed by The Humanist Association of Ireland with 111 or 14.6% of ceremonies, The Spiritualist Union of Ireland accounted for 76 or 10.0% of ceremonies and the remainder of same-sex couples (i.e. 5.9%) had ceremonies with other religious denominations.

Over one-third of all same-sex marriage ceremonies took place in the Dublin City area (39.0%), followed by Meath with 5.0%.

The most popular month for same-sex ceremonies in 2017 was September with 98 (12.9%) marriages.

Friday was the most popular day for same-sex marriages with over one third (287) or 37.8% of all same-sex marriages celebrated on that day.  As with opposite-sex marriages, Sunday was the least popular day for same-sex marriages when only 20 couples (2.6%) wed.

Friday 1st September was the most popular date for same-sex marriages in 2017 with 11 (1.4%) marriages occurring on that day. This was followed by Friday 23rd June, 30th June, 7th July, 6th October and 13th October, when 10 (1.3%) marriages took place on each of those dates.