The U.S. Census Bureau released on April 14 a series of data tables showing the most common first and last names reported in the 2020 Census.
The new data provides insight into naming trends across the United States, with information broken down by race, Hispanic origin, and sex. The release includes national-level counts for last names by race and Hispanic origin, first names by race and Hispanic origin, as well as first names by sex. A summary table also compares the most common names in previous censuses from 1790 to 2020.
According to the Census Bureau, this is the first time since 1990 that data on first names has been provided alongside surname information. The bureau said it has produced counts of the most common surnames for each census since 1990.
Eight surnames—Brown, Davis, Johnson, Jones, Miller, Smith, Williams and Wilson—have remained among the top fifteen since the nation’s first census in 1790. The agency noted that predominantly Hispanic last names have become more prominent over time; since 2000 six such surnames—Garcia, Gonzalez, Hernandez, Lopez, Martinez and Rodriguez—have joined the top fifteen list.
Between 2010 and 2020 all but one of the fastest-growing last names among those ranked in the top thousand were predominantly Asian—a shift from previous decades that reflects changes in immigration patterns. While women outnumbered men nationally in 2020 according to census figures, all five of the most common first names were predominantly male. The bureau said this points to greater variety among female given names compared to male ones.
The files released contain only frequencies of individual first or last names without linking them to specific people or combinations of given name and surname. Statistical safeguards are used by the bureau to protect respondent confidentiality.
Further highlights can be found in America Counts’ story “Eight of the Nation’s Top 15 Last Names Stayed the Same Since 1790.” Full datasets and methodology are available on census.gov.
