Daryl
A masculine name of Old English origin meaning "beloved" or "dear one".
Name Census estimates that about 54,012 living Americans carry the first name Daryl. It is a predominantly male name (93.4% of registrations). The average person named Daryl today is around 56 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Daryl births was 1956 (1,968 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Daryl. 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 Daryl with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Compared to the 1960s, recent registration numbers for Daryl have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
54K
~ 1 in 6,346 Americans
Peak year
1956
1,968 babies that year
Average age
56
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,995
Tracked since 1912
Census
Daryl in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 50,924 people with the first name Daryl, which placed it at #890 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
#890
National first-name rank
People counted
51K
50,924 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
16.9
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
66.3% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Daryl
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Daryl is White at 66.3%. The next largest groups are Black (24.1%) and Two or More Races (3.0%). 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 Daryl 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 Daryl at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White66.3% · 33,767
- Black or African American24.1% · 12,254
- Two or more races3.0% · 1,521
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.9% · 1,489
- Hispanic or Latino2.6% · 1,325
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 568
Gender
Gender distribution for Daryl
Daryl leans heavily male at 93.4% of total registrations, but 4,419 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Daryl as a male name
- Ranked #1,995 in 2024
- 77 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1956 (1,832 births)
Daryl as a female name
- Ranked #10,901 in 2017
- 9 female births in 2017
- Peak: 1950 (165 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Daryl leans strongly male. 47,436 people counted with this name were male (93.2%), compared with 3,486 female bearers (6.8%).
Popularity
Daryl: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Daryl from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 12 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1960s, with 15,914 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1960s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Daryl 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 Daryl during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Daryls live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. California, New York, Pennsylvania recorded the most babies named Daryl, while Wyoming, Delaware, Vermont recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 1,197 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Daryl
The name Daryl is an English given name derived from the Old English word "deor" meaning "deer" or "beloved." It gained popularity in the late 19th century as a masculine name, although its origins can be traced back to the Middle Ages.
The earliest recorded use of the name Daryl dates back to the 13th century in England. One of the first known individuals with this name was Daryl of Winchester, a monk who lived in the early 1200s and authored several religious texts.
In the 14th century, the name was associated with a legendary figure named Daryl the Huntsman, who was said to be an expert archer and tracker. This association with hunting and the wilderness may have contributed to the name's enduring popularity in rural areas of England and Scotland.
During the Renaissance period, the name Daryl gained some prominence among the nobility. One notable figure was Sir Daryl Coventry (1509-1580), an English courtier and diplomat who served under Queen Elizabeth I.
In the 17th century, the name Daryl appeared in literary works, such as the play "The Merry Wives of Windsor" by William Shakespeare, where a character named Daryl is mentioned.
Throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, the name Daryl was relatively uncommon, but it experienced a resurgence in popularity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. One famous bearer of the name was Daryl F. Zanuck (1902-1979), an American film producer and co-founder of 20th Century Fox.
Other notable individuals named Daryl include Daryl Hall (born 1946), an American singer-songwriter best known as part of the duo Hall & Oates, and Daryl Hannah (born 1960), an American actress known for her roles in films like "Splash" and "Kill Bill."
In the world of sports, Daryl Strawberry (born 1962) was a former professional baseball player who played for the New York Mets and the New York Yankees, while Daryl Morey (born 1972) is a former NBA executive and current president of basketball operations for the Philadelphia 76ers.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Daryl
People
Daryl + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Daryl 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
Daryl: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Daryl?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 54,012 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Daryl 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 6,346 US residents.
Is Daryl a common name?
We classify Daryl as "Uncommon". It ranks above 99.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 67,359 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Daryl most popular?
The single biggest year for Daryl was 1956, when 1,968 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Daryl is about 56 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Daryl in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 50,924 people with the name Daryl, or 16.86 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #890 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 Daryl 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 Daryl?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Daryl leans strongly male. 47,436 people counted with this name were male (93.2%), compared with 3,486 female bearers (6.8%). 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 Daryl?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Daryl is White at 66.3%. The next largest groups are Black (24.1%) and Two or More Races (3.0%). 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 Daryl most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Daryl in the 2020 Census, accounting for 66.3% (33,767 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 Daryl in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Daryl a male name?
Yes, 93.4% of people registered as Daryl 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 Daryl still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Daryl 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 Daryl 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 Daryl?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.