Five countries, five ways of living alone

China

123 million

people living alone in 2024, according to the Beike Research Institute, which projects 150 to 200 million by 2030. The National Bureau of Statistics put single-person households at nearly 20 per cent of all households in 2024. The Ministry of Civil Affairs recorded 6.76 million marriage registrations in 2025, down from 13.47 million in 2013.

Spending has followed: a report cited by CCTV Finance puts the solo-dining market at about 800 billion yuan in 2025. In January 2026 a daily check-in app for people living alone, Sileme (sold abroad as Demumu), reached the top of Apple's paid-app chart in China.

Japan

2.15 people

in the average household, the lowest figure on record, in the 2025 census by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications, which counted a record 57.12 million households. About 19 million homes hold one person, and 46 per cent of them are headed by someone aged 65 or over. The National Institute of Population and Social Security Research projects single-person households at 44.3 per cent of all homes by 2050, and 54.1 per cent in Tokyo.

Japanese writers have written for these readers for two decades: the sociologist Chizuko Ueno's Ohitorisama no Rōgo ("Old Age for One") series has sold 1.11 million copies, according to its publisher Bungeishunjū.

South Korea

36.1%

of all households, 8.04 million, hold one person, according to the National Data Agency (December 2025): the largest kind of household in the country. Korean has a word for the life: honjok, from hon (alone) and jok (tribe), with honbap for eating alone and honhaeng for travelling alone. Seollal, the Lunar New Year holiday, runs from 6 to 9 February in 2027.

India

17.4 million

people lived alone in India in 2020, and researchers project a sharp rise in single-person households in the big cities by 2050. Reporting by Onmanorama in August 2026 followed young Indians choosing to live alone despite the cost, and Indian reporters and researchers have documented the conditions single women face when renting a home alone in the large cities.

Southeast Asia

3,000 adults

across Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam took part in Milieu Insight's 2026 Solo Economy Study. Independence is valued; the main strain is making one income cover one home. Lunar New Year (Tết in Vietnam) falls on 6 February 2027.