What percentage of gay people are white

LGBTQ+ Identification in U.S. Rises to 9.3%

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Gallup’s latest update on LGBTQ+ identification finds 9.3% of U.S. adults detecting as lesbian, gay, multi-attracted , transgender or something other than heterosexual in 2024. This represents an amplify of more than a percentage point versus the prior estimate, from 2023. Longer term, the figure has nearly doubled since 2020 and is up from 3.5% in 2012, when Gallup first measured it.

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LGBTQ+ identification is increasing as younger generations of Americans enter adulthood and are much more likely than older generations to say they are something other than heterosexual. More than one in five Gen Z adults -- those born between 1997 and 2006, who were between the ages of 18 and 27 in 2024 -- identify as LGBTQ+. Each older generation of adults, from millennials to the Silent Generation, has successively lower rates of identification, down to 1.8% among the oldest Americans, those born before 1946.

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LGBTQ+ identification rates among young people have also increased, from an average 18.8% of Gen Z adults in 2020 through 2022 to an average of 22.7% over the past two years.

Gallup has

Growing LGBT ID Seen Across Major U.S. Racial, Ethnic Groups

Story Highlights

  • LGBT identification up among Black, White and Hispanic adults
  • More Hispanic adults than White, Black adults identify as LGBT
  • Higher Hispanic LGBT proportion due to the population's relative youth

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The expansion in the U.S. LGBT population that Gallup reported earlier this year is reflected across the nation's largest U.S. racial and ethnic groups. Non-Hispanic Inky, Non-Hispanic White, and Hispanic adults in the U.S. are all more likely today to identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans person or something other than heterosexual than they were in 2012, when Gallup began measuring LGBT identification.

The growth has been greater among Hispanic adults than among White or Jet adults, with Hispanic LGBT identification surpassing 8% in 2020 and reaching double digits in 2021. By contrast, just over 6% of White and Inky adults identify as LGBT in the latest estimates.

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These results are derived from Gallup's latest update on LGBT identification, reported in February and based on combined data from more than 12,000 telephone interviews conducted in 2

Diversity of sexual orientation

This record references studies from the 1950s to 2011. Please note that some of this information has been superceded by more recent studies and is included here as an historical document.

This summary sheet is not intended to be a comparative analysis or recommendation of the studies referenced. Its purpose is to respond to inquiries received by the Institute by indicating the range of findings in the research literature, beginning with Alfred Kinsey's two studies, often referred to together as the Kinsey Reports.

Studies often differ sharply in: 1) definitions; 2) methodology; 3) response rates. The majority are based on nonrandom samples. Some look at current/previous year behavior only and others at extended time periods in respondents' lives. They are listed in chronological order.

Contents

The 1948 and 1953 Studies of Alfred Kinsey

Kinsey's samples are best for younger adults, particularly the college-educated; they are poorest for minorities and those from decrease socioeconomic and educational levels. The original male sample included institutionalized men. Paul Gebhard (Gebhard 1979), a Kinsey research associate and later d

Racial Differences Among LGBT Adults in the US

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Overview

This final notify in the series, LGBT Well-Being at the Intersection of Race, uses numbers from the 2012-2017 Gallup Survey and the Generations/Transpop studies to assess whether LGBT people of color (POC) differ from White LGBT people on several areas of health and socioeconomic well-being. We find that more LGBT people of color state economic instability compared to White LGBT people on many indicators. Additionally, disparities for POC LGBT adults persist in the health domain, except for measures of depression where more White LGBT adults report having depression compared with POC LGBT adults. Further, more women of color who identify as LGBT reported living in a low-income domesticated, and experiencing unemployment and food insecurity compared to all other groups. We also found differences in outcomes among LGBT POC on some economic and health indicators. Overall, the series of papers demonstrate that the relationship between race and LGBT status is a complicated one that differs by outcome and racialized organization. Regardless of these complexities, the statistics point to the need for social and po what percentage of gay people are white

White LGBT Adults in the US

  • White LGBT adults are more likely to hire in high-risk health behaviors than Pale non-LGBT adults. Among White LGBT adults, 27% report current smoking and 9% report heavy drinking, compared to 18% and 7% of non-LGBT adults, respectively.
  • More White LGBT adults than non-LGBT adults report having mild or high disability, defined by the number of days that they experienced limitations due to poor health in the prior month. Among White adults, 28% reported experiencing mild disability, defined as experiencing limitations because of impoverished health for 1-14 days in the past month; 12% reported high disability, defined as experiencing limitations because of poor health for 15-30 days in the past month. By comparison, 20% of White non-LGBT adults reported mild disability, and 10% reported high disability.
  • Compared to White non-LGBT adults, White LGBT adults had greater odds of existence diagnosed with several serious health conditions, including asthma, diabetes, heart attack, cancer, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol. These disparities be for both Ivory LGBT men and women compared to non-LGBT men and women, with the exception of cancer for White w