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Marry someone your own age if you want to live happily ever after, according to a new study.

While many other factors like financial stability, having children, and dating duration before marriage can help predict marital success, new research reveals that age difference is another important variable in predicting marital success.

After analyzing data from more than 3,000 recently married and divorced Americans, researchers Randal Olson and Olga Khazan found that couples of the same age are significantly less likely than other couples to divorce, according to The Atlantic.

Couples who differ by one year in age were 3 percent more likely to divorce compared to their same-aged counterparts. A five-year age differences boosts divorce by 18 percent, and a ten-year age difference heightens divorce by 39 percent. The study also revealed that couples with 20 or 30 years in age discrepancy were 95 percent and 172 percent more likely than their same-aged counterparts to divorce.

For some, age is just a number. Not all couples with large age gaps are doomed to fail. Researcher said that the link could be explained by difference in life experience and cultural reference points. After all, successful marriages are characterized by equal and loving partnerships.