Creston
Of Old English origin, denoting a person from a settlement on a ridge.
Name Census estimates that about 606 living Americans carry the first name Creston. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Creston today is around 40 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Creston births was 1989 (19 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Creston. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
People living today
606
~ 1 in 565,601 Americans
Peak year
1989
19 babies that year
Average age
40
years old
2024 SSA rank
#9,135
Tracked since 1906
Census
Creston in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 593 people with the first name Creston, which placed it at #18,232 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#18,232
National first-name rank
People counted
593
593 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
72.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Creston
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Creston is White at 72.8%. The next largest groups are Black (16.2%) and Two or More Races (6.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Creston described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Creston at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White72.8% · 432
- Black or African American16.2% · 96
- Two or more races6.4% · 38
- Hispanic or Latino2.0% · 12
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.0% · 12
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.5% · 3
Popularity
Creston: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Creston from the 1900s through to the 2020s, spanning 13 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1990s, with 117 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1990s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Creston by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Creston during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Creston
The given name Creston finds its roots in the Old English language, with the word "creste" meaning "summit" or "ridge." This name likely originated in the Anglo-Saxon regions of England during the medieval period, around the 5th to 11th centuries.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Creston can be found in the Domesday Book, a comprehensive survey of landowners and their holdings undertaken in 1086 by order of William the Conqueror. In this document, a landowner named Creston is mentioned as holding property in the county of Lincolnshire.
Throughout the Middle Ages, the name Creston was primarily associated with individuals from the landed gentry or minor nobility in England. One notable bearer of this name was Sir Creston de Vere, a knight who fought alongside King Edward III during the Hundred Years' War in the 14th century.
As the use of surnames became more widespread in the later medieval period, the name Creston also began to appear as a surname, particularly in areas like Yorkshire and Lincolnshire. However, its usage as a given name declined in popularity.
In the 16th century, a notable figure named Creston Browne is recorded as a member of the English gentry from Norfolk. He was born in 1512 and served as a member of the Queen's Guard during the reign of Elizabeth I.
Fast-forwarding to the 19th century, Creston was the given name of Creston Dowd, an American businessman and industrialist born in 1832 in New York. He made his fortune in the textile industry and was a prominent figure in the city of Rochester.
Another individual of note was Creston Vaughan, a British explorer and naturalist born in 1845. He is known for his expeditions to the Amazon rainforest and his contributions to the study of South American flora and fauna.
In more recent times, Creston was the name of Creston Boxill, a Jamaican musician and composer born in 1919. He was a prominent figure in the development of Jamaican folk music and played a significant role in the island's cultural renaissance in the mid-20th century.
These are just a few examples of notable individuals throughout history who bore the given name Creston, which has its roots in the Old English language and was once associated with the landed gentry and minor nobility in medieval England.
People
Creston + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Creston as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with C
Other first names starting with C with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Creston: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Creston?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 606 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Creston going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 565,601 US residents.
Is Creston a common name?
We classify Creston as "Very Rare". It ranks above 86.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 835 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Creston most popular?
The single biggest year for Creston was 1989, when 19 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Creston is about 40 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Creston in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 593 people with the name Creston, or 0.20 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #18,232 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Creston in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Creston?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Creston leans strongly male. 574 people counted with this name were male (96.5%), compared with 21 female bearers (3.5%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Creston?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Creston is White at 72.8%. The next largest groups are Black (16.2%) and Two or More Races (6.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Creston most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Creston in the 2020 Census, accounting for 72.8% (432 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Creston in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Creston a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Creston in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Creston still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Creston in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Creston can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people are called Creston?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.