As the COVID-19 situation ramped up in April, the couple acted quickly to shift their wedding, due to be held in Melbourne, from August 2020 to July 2021.

Ms Buchanan said, "There was a period of a couple of weeks where everything was coming out of lockdown at the end of June ... and we regretted it for a moment."

Tim Newport said, "What happened in the end was that our original wedding date landed smack bang in the middle of Melbourne's lockdown."

Ms Buchanan said, "Now we are pretty confident in that decision, but hindsight is 2020. We couldn't have guessed what was going to happen."

They said they were lucky to have been able to move the date and that they hadn't already committed money they could not get back.

Provisional data published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Friday suggests the number of weddings fell by more than 30 per cent in the first six months of 2020.

Only 38,000 marriages occurred between January and June. The 2015-19 average over the period is 55,000 weddings.

ABS health and vital statistics section director James Eynstone-Hinkins said likely causes of the matrimony slump included social distancing requirements, size limits on gatherings and travel restrictions.

Ms Buchanan said, "Weddings to me have always seemed like a big family celebration."

"Because we're located in Canberra and obviously the rest of our families are in Melbourne if we had rushed it we would have been here, and we would have essentially been alone."

"We already made these plans to have a big wedding to have everyone celebrate with us. We didn't want to compromise that."

Tim Newport said, "[Roberta] and I have been seeing each other for eight years now, so we felt we could wait an extra year."

Despite restrictions, Mr Eynstone-Hinkins said nearly 10,000 couples wed between April and June.

"Marriages that occurred between April and June 2020 were slightly less likely to be first time marriages and it was less likely that both partners were born in Australia," he said.

Between April and June, Victoria recorded the largest decrease in marriages at 65.1 per cent. Meanwhile the ACT had the smallest decrease at 42.7 per cent.

Meanwhile, the ABS published marriage and divorce data for 2019, finding marriages decreased by 4.5 per cent compared with 2018's figures. There was also a very slight decrease in divorces in 2019, from 49,404 divorces in 2018 to 49,116 divorces in 2019.

Over the decade, the marriage rate decreased from 5.5 marriages per 1000 people in 2009 to 4.5. Divorce rates have also decreased over a decade from 2.3 to 1.9 divorces per 1000 people.

Spring was the most popular season to wed, with 32 percent of 2019 marriages being held in the season. However March was the most popular month to get married in 2019.

Saturday, October 19, was the most popular day for a wedding last year, when 1976 couples said "I do".