Here are the six most common forms of adoption in the US today. 

Private: Private agency adoptions are still the most common type of adoption in the United States. Different agencies are licensed by each State, and they place children in non-relative homes. The other main type of private adoption is when birthparents directly hire an independent facilitator or doctor to place the child in a non-relative home.  Each year, this adoption method accounts for 30-45% of all adoptions. 

Public: In what is known as a “public adoption”, children in government welfare programs are placed into homes. The placement decision is either made by the government agencies, or privately contracted adoption agencies. Today, public agency adoptions account for roughly 15 or 20% of all adoptions.

Kinship: This is an extremely private and unregulated type of adoption.  It is really simple, and basically involves the birthparents placing their child into a relative’s home. This is often done without the use of any agency or facilitator.

Stepparent: Along with Kinship adoptions, Stepparent adoptions make up a solid percentage of all adoptions. They often occur after a parent with full custody of children from a divorce, remarries. The stepparent then may officially adopt the spouse’s children. Stepparent and kinship adoptions account for roughly 40% of all adoptions every year.

Trans-racial: This is not a specific type of adoption. Trans-racial adoptions refer to a child being adopted by parents of a different race. This can be done privately, publicly, or independently, but is most often associated with government welfare programs. This only accounts for a small percentage of adoptions each year.   

Inter-country/International: This type of adoption refers to adoptions of babies from other countries across the world. In the US, this has become increasingly popular over the last 15 or so years. This may now account for somewhere around 10% of all adoptions. 
 
Keep in mind that specific statistics on adoption today aren’t officially recorded anywhere. Also, these numbers only account for licensed or public adoptions. Many forms of private or independent adoptions are often difficult to keep a record of.