How Many Marriage and Family Therapists Does New York City Have?
Page Contents
As of July 1, 2026, 476 licensed marriage and family therapists (LMFTs) had a New York City mailing address, about 4.2 for every 10,000 married-couple households. Manhattan had 8.5 per 10,000; Staten Island had 1.6. The city count is up from 423 on January 1, 2025.
Key numbers
- 476licensed marriage and family therapists with a New York City mailing address, 31% of the 1,518 in New York StateNYSED Office of the Professions, as of July 1, 2026
- 4.2LMFTs per 10,000 married-couple households in NYC, vs 4.9 in the rest of the stateOur calculation: NYSED (July 2026) and Census ACS 2025 1-year
- 292new LMFT licenses issued in New York in 2025, up 97% from 148 in 2024NYSED, licenses issued by calendar year
- +53more LMFTs with a NYC mailing address than on January 1, 2025 (423), a 13% rise in 18 monthsNYSED, July 1, 2026, and the same NYSED page as archived on June 12, 2025
- 2.1%LMFTs’ share of the 22,663 NYC licensees in four therapy licenses: LMFT, clinical social worker (LCSW), psychologist and mental health counselor (LMHC)NYSED, July 1, 2026
Marriage and family therapists by borough
LMFT counts by county of mailing address on record with NYSED, as of July 1, 2026. Married-couple households: Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2025 1-year, table B11001. Manhattan = New York County, Brooklyn = Kings, Staten Island = Richmond.
| Borough | LMFTs (Jan. 1, 2025) | LMFTs (July 1, 2026) | Married-couple households (2025, ±90% MOE) | LMFTs per 10,000 households | Households per LMFT | LMFTs per 100,000 residents |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manhattan | 168 | 191 | 224,159 (±10,114) | 8.5 | 1,174 | 11.5 |
| Brooklyn | 110 | 123 | 347,074 (±9,690) | 3.5 | 2,822 | 4.6 |
| Queens | 92 | 100 | 356,616 (±9,856) | 2.8 | 3,566 | 4.2 |
| Bronx | 39 | 48 | 129,122 (±6,860) | 3.7 | 2,690 | 3.4 |
| Staten Island | 14 | 14 | 86,887 (±5,099) | 1.6 | 6,206 | 2.8 |
| New York City | 423 | 476 | 1,143,858 | 4.2 | 2,403 | 5.5 |
| Rest of New York State | 917 | 1,042 | 2,139,258 | 4.9 | 2,053 | 9.1 |
| New York State | 1,340 | 1,518 | 3,283,116 | 4.6 | 2,163 | 7.6 |
New licenses: a jump in 2025
New York issued 292 marriage and family therapist licenses in 2025, up from 148 in 2024 and the most in any of the five years NYSED lists. New licenses rose in other mental health professions too, but by less: mental health counselors +46%, psychologists +30% and clinical social workers +9%. NYSED does not give a reason for the increase, so we do not suggest one.
| Profession | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | Change, 2024 to 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Marriage and family therapists (LMFT) | 139 | 169 | 177 | 148 | 292 | +97% |
| Licensed clinical social workers (LCSW) | 1,907 | 2,063 | 2,095 | 2,419 | 2,636 | +9% |
| Psychologists | 598 | 696 | 774 | 706 | 915 | +30% |
| Mental health counselors (LMHC) | 1,009 | 1,050 | 1,209 | 1,212 | 1,768 | +46% |
| Creative arts therapists | 109 | 136 | 156 | 131 | 165 | +26% |
| Psychoanalysts | 29 | 44 | 37 | 37 | 36 | -3% |
How LMFTs compare with other licensed therapists in NYC
Of the 22,663 people with a New York City mailing address who hold one of four therapy licenses (marriage and family therapist, clinical social worker, psychologist or mental health counselor), 2.1% are marriage and family therapists. Of the six licensed mental health professions in the table below, marriage and family therapists are the fewest in the city.
| Profession | Manhattan | Brooklyn | Queens | Bronx | Staten Island | NYC total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Marriage and family therapists (LMFT) | 191 | 123 | 100 | 48 | 14 | 476 |
| Licensed clinical social workers (LCSW) | 4,792 | 3,927 | 2,257 | 1,069 | 558 | 12,603 |
| Psychologists | 3,177 | 1,237 | 605 | 200 | 117 | 5,336 |
| Mental health counselors (LMHC) | 1,075 | 1,410 | 1,088 | 349 | 326 | 4,248 |
| Creative arts therapists | 280 | 403 | 182 | 33 | 17 | 915 |
| Psychoanalysts | 402 | 96 | 33 | 6 | 6 | 543 |
What this means for couples looking for a therapist
- Licensed marriage and family therapists are a small group in a big city: 476 have a city mailing address, compared with 12,603 licensed clinical social workers and 5,336 psychologists. Many couples therapists in New York hold one of those other licenses, so a therapist’s license type alone does not tell you whether they work with couples.
- New York’s Education Law (section 8403) defines marriage and family therapy around marital, couple, family and other personal relationships. If that focus matters to you, ask any therapist you are considering how much of their practice is couples work and what training they have in it.
- You can check any New York therapist’s license, including its status, on the NYSED license verification search.
- Borough counts follow mailing addresses, and many therapists see clients by video, so where an LMFT is registered does not limit who can see them. Couples in boroughs with fewer LMFTs per household may find more options by looking citywide or online.
- The number of LMFTs is growing: New York issued 292 new LMFT licenses in 2025, about twice the 148 issued in 2024, and registered LMFTs statewide rose from 1,391 in April 2021 to 1,976 in April 2025.
How we did this
The New York State Education Department (NYSED) Office of the Professions publishes, for each licensed profession, a count of licensees by county as of July 1, 2026, and the number of licenses issued in each of the past five calendar years. We added the five New York City counties (New York, Kings, Queens, Bronx and Richmond) to get the city total, and divided each borough’s count by its number of married-couple households from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey (ACS) 2025 1-year estimates (table B11001, “married-couple family”). We used the same NYSED pages, read on the same day, for the five other licensed mental health professions in the comparison table. For the January 1, 2025 counts we used the same NYSED page as saved by the Internet Archive on June 12, 2025; its licenses-issued figures for 2021 to 2024 match today’s page.
Limits
- NYSED counts a licensee in the county of their primary mailing address on record, which may be a home or an office. A therapist who lives in Brooklyn and works in Manhattan counts in Brooklyn.
- The counts are registered licensees. NYSED notes that being registered “does not necessarily mean the licensee is actively engaged in practice.”
- The study counts licenses, not couples therapists: a therapist can hold more than one license, and many couples therapists hold a license other than LMFT. It does not count therapists licensed in other states who may see New Yorkers by video where the law allows.
- Married-couple households are survey estimates with margins of error (shown in the table) and include same-sex married couples. Unmarried couples are not in the denominator. The household estimates are for 2025; the license counts are for July 2026.
- In NYSED’s table the county counts add up to 1,519, one more than the published New York State total of 1,518; we use the published state total and the published county counts as they are.
Sources
- NYSED Office of the Professions, License Statistics for Marriage and Family Therapy. Geographic distribution as of July 1, 2026, and licenses issued 2021 to 2025. Read November 12, 2026.
- NYSED license statistics for clinical social work, psychology, mental health counseling, creative arts therapy and psychoanalysis. Same tables and dates, used for the comparison. Clinical social work: LCSW statistics.
- NYSED License Statistics for Marriage and Family Therapy, archived copy (Internet Archive, June 12, 2025). County counts as of January 1, 2025.
- NYSED, Number of Registered Licensees (as of April 1), 2021 to 2025. Statewide registered marriage and family therapists by year.
- U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2025 1-year estimates, table B11001 (Household Type) and B01003 (Total Population). Married-couple households and population, five NYC counties and New York State, via the Census Data API.
- New York State Education Law, Article 163, section 8403. Definition of the practice of marriage and family therapy.
Cite this study
spiral2grow. (2026). How Many Marriage and Family Therapists Does New York City Have?. spiral2grow Marriage & Family Therapy, New York, NY. https://www.spiral2grow.com/research/nyc-marriage-family-therapists/
Download the data: nyc-marriage-family-therapists.csv (LMFTs, married-couple households and rates by borough, plus licenses issued and the six-profession comparison). Free to reuse under CC BY 4.0 with credit to spiral2grow and a link to this page.
Looking for a couples therapist in New York City?
Moshe Ratson, LMFT, MBA, is a licensed marriage and family therapist (New York license #000697) who sees couples in Midtown Manhattan, near Grand Central Station, and online by video. A free phone consultation is the first step.
Request a free consultationCall (917) 692-3867In crisis? Call or text 988, or call 911.
