Darwin
A masculine given name derived from the Old English words "derwine" meaning "dear friend".
Name Census estimates that about 17,557 living Americans carry the first name Darwin. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Darwin today is around 45 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Darwin births was 1958 (424 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Darwin. 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.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Darwin with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Darwin is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 89 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
18K
~ 1 in 19,522 Americans
Peak year
1958
424 babies that year
Average age
45
years old
2024 SSA rank
#839
Tracked since 1881
Census
Darwin in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 21,718 people with the first name Darwin, which placed it at #1,522 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
#1,522
National first-name rank
People counted
22K
21,718 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
7.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
40.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Darwin
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Darwin is White at 40.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (40.1%) and Black (10.0%). 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 Darwin 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 Darwin at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White40.9% · 8,889
- Hispanic or Latino40.1% · 8,710
- Black or African American10.0% · 2,164
- Asian and Pacific Islander5.7% · 1,231
- Two or more races1.9% · 415
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.4% · 309
Gender
Gender distribution for Darwin
Out of the 26,189 babies given the name Darwin since 1880, 99.7% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Darwin as a male name
- Ranked #839 in 2024
- 293 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1958 (417 births)
Darwin as a female name
- Ranked #14,228 in 2018
- 6 female births in 2018
- Peak: 2014 (8 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Darwin appears almost entirely male. Of the 21,720 people counted with this name, 99.2% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Darwin: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Darwin from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1950s, with 3,496 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 1950s peak, Darwin remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Darwin 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 Darwin during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Darwins live
The SSA's state-level files cover 46 states and territories. New York, California, Texas recorded the most babies named Darwin, while Wyoming, Vermont, Hawaii recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 449 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Darwin
The name Darwin is an English given name derived from the Old English word "deor", meaning "beloved" or "dear one". It has been in use since at least the 11th century, with early records showing variations such as Derwine and Deorwine.
One of the earliest known bearers of the name was Derwine, a monk and saint who lived in the 7th century in what is now Northumbria, England. He was known for founding several monasteries and his dedication to the Christian faith.
The name gained wider recognition in the 19th century due to the renowned English naturalist Charles Robert Darwin (1809-1882). Darwin is best known for his groundbreaking work on the theory of evolution by natural selection, outlined in his landmark book "On the Origin of Species" published in 1859.
Another notable bearer of the name was Darwin D. Martin (1865-1935), an American businessman and leading figure in the Larkin Company. He commissioned Frank Lloyd Wright to design several residential and commercial buildings, including the Darwin D. Martin House in Buffalo, New York, which is considered a masterpiece of Prairie School architecture.
In the world of literature, Darwin L. Teilhet (1904-1976) was an American writer and journalist who authored several novels and short stories, including "The Whisper of the Axe" and "The Horizontal Nightmare".
More recently, Darwin Enrique Quintero (born 1980) is a Venezuelan professional baseball pitcher who has played for various teams in Major League Baseball, including the Houston Astros and the San Francisco Giants.
While the name Darwin has its roots in Old English, it has gained global recognition and has been used across various cultures and regions, often as a tribute to the influential naturalist Charles Darwin and his groundbreaking scientific contributions.
People
Darwin + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Darwin as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with D
Other first names starting with D with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Darwin: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Darwin?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 17,557 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Darwin 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 19,522 US residents.
Is Darwin a common name?
We classify Darwin as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 26,189 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Darwin most popular?
The single biggest year for Darwin was 1958, when 424 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Darwin is about 45 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Darwin in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 21,718 people with the name Darwin, or 7.19 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,522 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 Darwin 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 Darwin?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Darwin appears almost entirely male. Of the 21,720 people counted with this name, 99.2% were male and only a very small share were female. 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 Darwin?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Darwin is White at 40.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (40.1%) and Black (10.0%). 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 Darwin most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Darwin in the 2020 Census, accounting for 40.9% (8,889 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 Darwin in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Darwin a male name?
Yes, 99.7% of people registered as Darwin 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 Darwin still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Darwin 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 Darwin 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 Darwin?
You can see how many Americans are named Darwin on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org — same data roots, lighter UI.