Why China's couples are hiring agents to end their marriages

In many parts of China today, securing a divorce isn't just emotionally fraught—it’s a logistical marathon. Couples must compete online for limited daily appointment slots released by government websites. These digital queues open at midnight and close within seconds, often leaving applicants frustrated and stuck in limbo.

Enter a new breed of online side hustlers: divorce slot agents. One of them is 30-year-old Qin Meng, a medical office worker by day who turns into a high-speed clicker-for-hire at night. For 400 yuan (about US$56), she takes over the task of booking divorce slots for overwhelmed couples, hitting the “confirm” button at precisely the right millisecond.

“Miss it by seconds,” she explains, “and the daily slots are gone.”

Qin Meng isn’t alone. Dozens—possibly hundreds—of similar agents now advertise on Chinese social media, offering their services to people who’ve sometimes tried for months to secure an appointment. These agents are not lawyers or marriage counselors. They’re technologists in a bureaucracy-bound world.

In theory, China’s Ministry of Civil Affairs allows couples to apply for no-fault divorces by appointment through local government portals. But in practice, the process is plagued by bottlenecks. Limited daily quotas, outdated digital infrastructure, and rising demand have created a nightly frenzy resembling a concert ticket drop or sneaker release.

This bottleneck is not a recent phenomenon—but the ways around it have evolved. Some agents use browser automation scripts to simulate lightning-fast inputs. Others open multiple browser tabs and toggle between them manually, fueled by muscle memory and caffeine. Many operate via WeChat or Xiaohongshu (China’s Instagram-equivalent), offering digital order forms and testimonials from satisfied clients.

Most agents cater to Tier 1 and Tier 2 cities, where divorce rates are high, tech literacy is widespread, and frustration with the system is most acute.

At first glance, the idea of paying someone to secure a divorce appointment may seem absurd. But the demand for such services is real—and rising. A big part of the reason lies in the emotional toll and social urgency of divorce in modern China. Many couples feel trapped in unhappy marriages but face long waiting periods due to administrative gridlock. In some cities, securing a slot may take weeks—or even months. During that time, joint assets hang in limbo, cohabitation becomes unbearable, and legal closure remains out of reach.

For many, hiring a slot agent isn’t just a convenience. It’s a lifeline. What’s more, the market for these services is growing. Some slot agents earn more from their nightly side hustle than from their day jobs. Others, like Qin Meng, see their work as both service and survival: a way to earn extra cash while helping others through a difficult life transition.

1. China’s Slowing Economy and Rising Marital Stress

Divorce rates in China have been rising steadily for over a decade, though they dipped slightly in 2021 after a new “cooling-off period” law required couples to wait 30 days before finalizing their split. But the underlying drivers—financial stress, urban alienation, and generational change—have not gone away.

Young couples today face a harsh economic landscape: stagnant wages, soaring housing prices, and precarious employment. Many live far from extended family, lack support systems, and struggle with incompatible life goals. Financial strain is now one of the top cited causes of marital breakdown. In this environment, marriage feels less like a permanent bond and more like a fragile partnership—one that can fracture under economic pressure.

2. Digital Infrastructure Lagging Behind Demand

Despite China’s reputation for cutting-edge digital governance, many civil services still run on legacy systems. Local divorce portals are often poorly designed, overloaded, and vulnerable to latency. Some require CAPTCHA input or multi-step verification, further slowing down the process.

This gap between service delivery and user demand is fertile ground for gray-market solutions. Just as daigou shoppers bypass import restrictions to supply luxury goods from abroad, divorce slot agents bypass technical friction to deliver time-sensitive relief.

3. Marriage Norms Are Evolving

It’s no longer taboo to seek a divorce in China—especially in urban centers. Women, in particular, are initiating more separations as they gain financial independence and reject traditional roles. But social change has outpaced system change.

The state's slow adaptation to these shifts is partly ideological. Marriage is still promoted as a social stabilizer. Divorce, by contrast, is often framed as a social failure—even though it increasingly reflects rational choice and personal autonomy.

The very fact that divorce appointments have become scarce commodities reflects how normalized marital breakdown has become. Divorce is no longer a private family affair—it’s now a publicly mediated process, shaped by waitlists and timestamps. The emotional stress of ending a relationship is compounded by the procedural stress of booking the end of it.

This is a classic example of how inefficiency breeds innovation. A flawed public system creates openings for informal entrepreneurs who monetize access. The same phenomenon has been seen in China's healthcare sector, where “hospital slot scalpers” sell doctor appointments, and in education, where parents pay intermediaries to navigate complex school enrolment procedures. These markets don’t emerge in spite of bureaucracy—they emerge because of it.

The rise of divorce slot agents should prompt urgent review. If hundreds of people are paying strangers to help them navigate a state service, the state has failed to deliver adequate access. Improving the UX (user experience) of civic portals, expanding daily appointment caps, and using queue-based algorithms instead of timestamp races would all help reduce the burden. Digitizing a service is only the first step. Making it functional and humane is the next.

What began as a fringe workaround has become a micro-industry—and a revealing signal of societal change. Divorce slot agents like Qin Meng aren’t the problem. They’re a mirror. A reflection of a generation navigating love, loss, and state bureaucracy all at once. Their midnight hustle shows that when emotional distress meets digital dysfunction, informal solutions fill the void. But that shouldn’t be the long-term answer.

If China wants to support families—not just form them—it must reimagine how it handles separation. That means acknowledging that the decision to divorce isn’t inherently chaotic or shameful. It’s often rational. Sometimes even necessary. And always deserving of dignity in process. Until then, the quiet click of midnight keyboards will continue to echo the cracks in China’s marriage machine.