Delio
Of Spanish origin meaning "the delicate one".
Name Census estimates that about 77 living Americans carry the first name Delio. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Delio today is around 40 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Delio births was 1973 (9 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Delio. 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.
Key insights
- • Fewer than 100 living Americans are believed to carry the name Delio. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
77
~ 1 in 4,451,355 Americans
Peak year
1973
9 babies that year
Average age
40
years old
2010 SSA rank
#12,716
Tracked since 1915
Census
Delio in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 640 people with the first name Delio, which placed it at #17,310 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
#17,310
National first-name rank
People counted
640
640 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
78.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Delio
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Delio is Hispanic at 78.6%. The next largest groups are White (14.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (5.9%). 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 Delio 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 Delio at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino78.6% · 503
- White14.4% · 92
- Asian and Pacific Islander5.9% · 38
- Black or African American1.1% · 7
Popularity
Delio: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Delio from the 1910s through to the 2010s, spanning 10 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1970s, with 20 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1970s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Delio 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 Delio 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 Delio
The given name Delio is believed to have originated from the Latin word "delius," which means "of or belonging to the island of Delos." Delos was a small island in the Cyclades archipelago in the Aegean Sea, considered a sacred place in ancient Greek mythology as the birthplace of the gods Apollo and Artemis. The name Delio likely emerged during the classical era of ancient Greece and Rome, between the 8th century BC and the 6th century AD.
Delio was not a particularly common name in ancient times, but it did appear in some historical records and literary works. One notable mention is in the writings of the Roman historian Pliny the Elder, who lived from 23-79 AD. In his work "Natural History," he referred to a certain "Delius of Ephesus," who was a renowned painter and sculptor during the 1st century AD.
The earliest recorded individual with the name Delio appears to be Delio Azzalini, an Italian painter and architect who lived in the late 16th and early 17th centuries (c. 1560-1638). He was best known for his work on the Church of Santa Maria della Salute in Venice, which he helped design and decorate.
Another notable figure named Delio was Delio Cantimori, an Italian historian and philosopher who lived from 1904 to 1966. He was a prominent scholar of the Protestant Reformation and is considered one of the founders of the modern study of heresy and religious dissent.
In the realm of literature, one can find Delio Tessa, an Italian poet and journalist who was born in 1886 and died in 1939. He was a prominent figure in the Futurist movement and is known for his experimental and avant-garde poetry.
A more recent example is Delio Rossi, an Italian football manager and former player who was born in 1960. He has managed several professional clubs in Italy, including Fiorentina, Lazio, and Palermo.
While the name Delio has ancient roots and a few notable bearers throughout history, it has never been a particularly widespread or common name, especially outside of Italy and certain regions of Europe where Latin-derived names were more prevalent.
People
Delio + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Delio 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
Delio: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Delio?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 77 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Delio 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 4,451,355 US residents.
Is Delio a common name?
We classify Delio as "Very Rare". It ranks above 60.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 98 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Delio most popular?
The single biggest year for Delio was 1973, when 9 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Delio 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 Delio in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 640 people with the name Delio, or 0.21 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #17,310 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 Delio 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 Delio?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Delio leans strongly male. 631 people counted with this name were male (98.9%), compared with 7 female bearers (1.1%). 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 Delio?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Delio is Hispanic at 78.6%. The next largest groups are White (14.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (5.9%). 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 Delio most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Delio in the 2020 Census, accounting for 78.6% (503 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 Delio in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Delio a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Delio 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 Delio still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Delio 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 Delio 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 Delio?
You can see how many people have the name Delio on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org — same data roots, lighter UI.