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More than four out of five Koreans aged from 30 to 34 are unmarried, adding to grave concerns on the country's low birth rate and its rapidly-shrinking population, data showed, Thursday.

In a regular summary of report on Korean Statistical Information Service (KOSIS) data, Statistics Korea said 81.5 percent or 7.83 million of the 9.61 million men and women in the aforementioned age group were single in 2020.

The proportion of singles marked more than a three-fold increase from 18.7 percent in 2000.

The pace of increase was also steeper than two other surveyed age groups.

For those aged from 25 to 29, the rate increased by 33.2 percentage points — from 54.2 percent to 87.4 percent over the period from 2000 to 2020.

For those aged 19 to 24, it went up by 5.6 percentage points — from 93.1 percent to 98.7 percent over the 20 years.

Of those aged from 30 to 34 in 2020, 86.1 percent of the men and 76.7 percent of the women were single.

In particular, 50.5 percent of those with a higher education did not get married.

"It was the first time that more than half of the surveyed people remained single," the report stated.

The report pointed out the proportion of young people out of the country's entire population has continued to fall after it peaked at 31.9 percent in 1990.

The rate dropped to 20.4 percent in 2020. And by 2050, it is expected to further shrink to 11 percent.

Korea has also broken its own record of having the world's lowest birth rate.

The fertility rate, the average number of expected births from a woman in her lifetime, slid to 0.72 from the previous year's 0.78.