What do you think is the right length of time before marriage?

[Totemoneru]

Assuming a couple were both wanting marriage and money wasn't an issue, how long should they be in a relationship for before tying the knot? Or is there a milestone that needs to be reached? Such as living together.
Will add a poll for ease but interested in people's reasoning.

They need to be living together and been through 4 season.

I think it takes a year of living together at least before you start to know someone. I also think it depends on the age and relationship experience of the people involved. If you’re late thirties, know what you’re looking for, what you won’t settle for, and if you want children then about a year would be fine, if you’re early twenties you might want to wait five years. I doing think there’s a magic one fits all.

I think it's best to live together first to check you're compatible when it's 24/7! Other than that, I sort of think when you know you know. My DH said he "knew" within a month or two he wanted to marry me, then he was 100% certain it would work when we moved in together.

We got married after 7 years, but got engaged after 4 years. It would have been sooner but covid pushed the wedding back 2 years!

So definitely living together first! Maybe 3-4 years if you're under 25, 2-3 years if you're 25-30, then over 30 I'd say anytime.

In my opinion you shouldn’t get married before having lived together and until well after the so called honeymoon period has expired. I would say not before 3 years.

There will be posts incoming from people saying they got married after 27 days and are still together 30 years later and when you know, you know.

We got married after a year. We didn't live together beforehand either. My marriage is the easiest part of my life.

I’d say a year to three years. After 3 years the bloom often goes over and the urge to marry passes… Kinda get in a rut. If haven’t decided to go for it by 3 years then probably dobNt want to. I don’t think you need to live together first, that is more a cultural thing.

I think about 1-2 years to get engaged, 2-3 years to getting married is ideal. Less if you're older.

Anything longer than 5 years in your twenties and 3 years in your thirties is too long if you want kids.

If you're sure you never want children then it's ok for it to be longer. If you're older with children already and you don't want more, then I don't think it matters as much.

Tough one. Do you plan on living together after marriage? 3-4 years I would say if not living together, it gives you more opportunity to get to know them through general bickers, life stresses etc. Also it comes down really to where you both are in life and commitment etc.

The people I know who married sooner than 5 years all divorced (especially those who had timetables for milestones), as did those after 10+. After 4-5 years, there's been a good chance to have actually encountered some difficulties, ill health, redundancy, etc, and either fallen by the wayside or come through the other side and decide that you do actually still rather like one another.

We got together and spent a year or so staying at each other’s houses. We then bought a house having not properly lived together (had a good idea as we spent most of our time together). Got married 5yrs later one afternoon just the two of us, no engagement. Had a baby a year after that.

I agree, loads of people I know got divorced after spending 10yrs together and being married for only a year!!

I would say years and that any time spent together before age of 25 shouldn't count

Its going to vary so much person to person, we got married on our second anniversary, by that point we had been living together for a year. I would never marry someone I hadn’t lived with.

We did nine years together first and lived together for five. As long as absolutely possible, and the only reason we got married then was because we were ready to have children. We only got engaged a year before, when the wedding date was set.
Wanted to minimise the chance of a failed engagement and a failed marriage.
Together 34 years so far.

We met in 2006, bought a house together in 2007 and married in 2008. Second marriage for both of us, but we both ‘knew.’ We’re still great together

Definitely need to give it 3 years and try living together. 3 years as others have said is when the Sheen wears off and you need to see if there is enough there to maintain a life long relationship and if you have enough going compatibility wise.

9 years before marriage and babies. We have been together for 30 years.
I am being tongue in cheek but I look at all the threads from devastated women after some horrible bloke has done a number on her and she is tied forever to the bastard because they have children together.

based on experience of being married twice with completely opposite timescales - I don't think there is right answer or even one that would make avoiding divorce more likely

I agree that living together is the minimum, but this will only allow you to establish whether you can stand the person day to day

However, it takes a lifetime to encounter all life scenarios, so if one was to wait to test the relationship through thick and thin then the appropriate age for marriage would be in our late 70s

Too many variables. Depends how old they are. And to the people who think they should get married after they moved in together, what if they have only moved in together after 6 months of knowing one another? And they are only 19?

What would be ideal is... meeting at around 22 to 25, moving in together after 1.5 to 2 years, (so age 24 to 27,) getting engaged a year after moving in (25 to 28,) and getting married 2 years after that - (27 to 30.)

If they meet at 16, then 10+ years is the answer. If they meet at 26, then 3-4 years. There is no one size fits all.

I don't think it's as simple as saying a particular length of time.

I do think that you need to consider
How long you've known each other?
Whether you have dealt with any stresses together?
Whether you have compatible financial ideas and behaviours?
Whether you have shared life goals?
Whether you've discussed if you want kids, and if you do have talked about and agreed how to manage child care and finances?

I also think neither partner should feel pressured.

Just add, if either partner has kids, far far more caution should be taken. In fact, if kids are involved, their safety and security should be the top priority.

We got married after 4 years, hadn’t lived together, we both moved out of our parents houses into our first home together after our wedding. Nearly married 24 years. Iwe got married at 23 and 26.

most people I know were married after 3or 4 years. The ones married within 2 and a half years are all divorced.

My husband and I were engaged 5 months after meeting and married 9 months after that. That was 23 years ago. We didn't have children before we married, which seems more unusual now.

Do claims he knew I was the one before we met in person, I know after one date. We get married later this year, it will be 5 years at that point, we're living together after 5 months

I was 3 years between meeting and marrying. We didn't live together til we got married - both religious upbringings. Now 15 years married and happy as ever.

Child came 7 years after marriage.