Jennifer Lopez has filed for divorce from Ben Affleck after two years of marriage, two decades after they first split.

Lopez submitted divorce papers in Los Angeles County Superior Court on Tuesday (US time) – two years to the day since the couple’s glamorous second wedding ceremony.

Spokespeople for the Hollywood actors did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

“She tried really hard to make things work, and is heartbroken,” a source told People magazine of Lopez.

“The kids are a top priority, as they always have been.”

The couple have five children between them.

Lopez has twins, Emme and Max, with her ex-husband Latin singer Marc Anthony, while Affleck has Violet, Seraphina and Samuel with his ex-wife Jennifer Garner.

The divorce filing was first reported by TMZ and follows months of speculation the couple’s marriage was in trouble. There was also a tense scene between the pair at the 2023 Grammy awards.

TMZ said Lopez listed the date of separation as April 26, 2024. It added that she did not mention any prenuptial agreement.

She has been active on social media in the months since, but her last post featuring Affleck was a promo video for her semi-autobiographical Prime Video show The Greatest Love Story Never Told.

This week’s step comes after the couple exchanged vows in a Las Vegas wedding chapel in July 2022, roughly two decades after a high-profile romance that ended in a break-up. Their children were their witnesses for the Vegas nuptials.

A second, much larger, ceremony followed on August 20, 2022, in the grounds of Affleck’s 35-hectare compound in Georgia.

Celebrities such as Matt Damon, Kevin Smith, Jason Mewes and Hollywood talent agent Patrick Whitesell were among the guests, while podcaster and life coach Jay Shetty officiated at the service.

Jennfier Lopez and Ben Affleck after some tension at the 2023 Grammys.

In the early 2000s, the pair dubbed “Bennifer” were the most talked about couple in the celebrity world in a relationship marked by his-and-her luxury cars and a 6.1-carat pink diamond engagement ring.

They abruptly called off their wedding in 2003 and split up a few months later.

But to the delight of many and perhaps the scepticism of others, they reunited two decades later and married – twice – in 2022.

“Love is beautiful. Love is kind. And it turns out love is patient. Twenty years patient,” wrote Lopez, announcing their first, quickie Las Vegas wedding and signing off as Jennifer Lynn Affleck.

“Stick around long enough and maybe you’ll find the best moment of your life in a drive through in Las Vegas at 12:30 in the morning in the tunnel of love drive through with your kids and the one you’ll spend forever with,” she wrote in her newsletter.

Both of them had been previously married.

Lopez married Anthony, her third husband, just five months after her 2004 split with Affleck.

Affleck, director and star of Oscar-winning film Argo, went on to marry, and later divorce, actor Jennifer Garner.

Lopez and Affleck started dating again in 2021, months after she and baseball star Alex Rodriguez called off their engagement and ended a four-year relationship.

Lopez said later that the initial break-up with Affleck “was the biggest heartbreak of my life”.

“I honestly felt like I was going to die,” she said in an interview with Apple Music in November 2022.

“But now, 20 years later, it does have a happy ending.”

-with AAP