United Methodist Church Sees Considerable Membership Drop in U.S.: Report

There are a few more empty spaces in United Methodist Church pews than there used to be, according to a new report.

A report from its General Council on Finance and Administration said membership fell by more than 170,000 in 2025, according to The Christian Post.

The denomination had about 3.814 million U.S. members in 2025, but it had 3.988 million U.S. members in 2024, a decline of 4.36 percent.

Meanwhile, in-person attendance dropped from about 1.074 million in 2024 to approximately 1.041 million in 2025, while online attendance fell from 1.037 million to about 986,000.

The UMC lost approximately 174,000 members in the United States in 2025, another staggering decline for a denomination already rocked by theological division, with thousands of churches departing. https://t.co/wKySViGsMI

— Charisma News (@charisma_news) October 22, 2026

The data showed the average in-person attendance at UMC services was just about 52 people, while the average online attendance was just under 49 people.

Of the UMC’s 20,158 churches, over half were classified as small or very small.

“There is no one single reason for the decline,” a representative of the General Council on Finance and Administration said, according to The Christian Post.

“People also profess their faith and come into the denomination for various reasons, so the membership number is a blend of those that departed and new members,” the representative said, noting that corrections from previous reports and even deaths are part of the data picture.

The UMC’s embrace of the LGBT movement has been part of the denomination’s story. From 2019 to 2023, more than 7,600 churches left the UMC, most of which were theologically conservative.

According to another recent report from The Christian Post, about 70 congregations in South Carolina are seeking to leave and take their property with them.

The Highland Park Methodist Church in Dallas is expected to sever ties with the UMC, according to WFAA-TV.

Highland Park United Methodist Church leaders have unanimously called for a congregational vote on October 25–26 to completely sever ties with the UMC while remaining Wesleyan. #ChristianPost #UMC #TexasMegachurch #Methodist https://t.co/MzY1xBaDub

— The Christian Post (@ChristianPost) October 19, 2026

In May, Lifeway Research noted that based on a survey of more than 7,000 congregations, the UMC is not alone in seeing declining attendance.

It reported that 46 percent of churches said their attendance dropped by at least 5 percent from 2020 to 2025, with 27 percent seeing attendance fall by 25 percent or more.

The report noted that the picture is not uniform.

“Evangelical Protestant churches grew 2% over the past five years. Catholic, Orthodox, and non-Christian congregations were largely stable. Mainline Protestant churches, however, declined by 20%,” the report said.

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