Ernst
A Germanic masculine name derived from the words "aron" meaning eagle and "nest" meaning home.
Name Census estimates that about 976 living Americans carry the first name Ernst. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Ernst today is around 56 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ernst births was 1917 (59 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ernst. 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
976
~ 1 in 351,183 Americans
Peak year
1917
59 babies that year
Average age
56
years old
2021 SSA rank
#12,707
Tracked since 1880
Census
Ernst in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,692 people with the first name Ernst, which placed it at #6,073 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
#6,073
National first-name rank
People counted
2.7K
2,692 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.9
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
52.4% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ernst
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ernst is White at 52.4%. The next largest groups are Black (41.6%) and Hispanic (2.9%). 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 Ernst 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 Ernst at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White52.4% · 1,410
- Black or African American41.6% · 1,120
- Hispanic or Latino2.9% · 79
- Two or more races1.9% · 52
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.9% · 24
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 7
Popularity
Ernst: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ernst from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1910s, with 371 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1910s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ernst 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 Ernst during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ernsts live
The SSA's state-level files cover 10 states and territories. New York, Wisconsin, Illinois recorded the most babies named Ernst, while Texas, Pennsylvania, Kentucky recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 40 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Ernst
The name Ernst has its origins in the Germanic languages, deriving from the Old High German name Ernust or Ernst, which means "fierce battle" or "ardent." It was a popular name among German nobility and warriors in the early Middle Ages.
Ernst is thought to have been formed from the Germanic elements "arn" meaning "eagle" and "nust" meaning "nest" or "strength." This combination evoked the image of a strong, fierce fighter, akin to an eagle protecting its nest.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Ernst dates back to the 8th century, when an Alemannic nobleman named Ernst was mentioned in the Codex Diplomaticus Alamannicus, a collection of historical documents from the region of modern-day Switzerland and southwestern Germany.
Throughout history, several notable figures have borne the name Ernst, including:
1. Ernst I, Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha (1784-1844), a German prince and the patriarch of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, a branch of the Saxon royal family.
2. Ernst Rutherford (1871-1937), a pioneering New Zealand-born physicist who is considered the father of nuclear physics for his groundbreaking work on radioactivity and the structure of the atom.
3. Ernst Jünger (1895-1998), a highly decorated German soldier, writer, and philosopher who is best known for his memoir "Storm of Steel," which recounts his experiences during World War I.
4. Ernst Lubitsch (1892-1947), a German-American film director and producer who is considered one of the most influential and important figures in the history of world cinema, known for his distinct comedic style and sophisticated touch.
5. Ernst Haeckel (1834-1919), a German biologist, naturalist, and philosopher who popularized the theory of evolution and coined several biological terms, including "ecology" and "phylum."
The name Ernst has maintained its popularity throughout the German-speaking world and has also been adopted in various forms in other European languages, such as the French Ernest and the Dutch Ernst or Ernest.
People
Ernst + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ernst as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with E
Other first names starting with E with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Ernst: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ernst?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 976 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ernst 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 351,183 US residents.
Is Ernst a common name?
We classify Ernst as "Very Rare". It ranks above 89.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,383 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ernst most popular?
The single biggest year for Ernst was 1917, when 59 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ernst 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 Ernst in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,692 people with the name Ernst, or 0.89 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #6,073 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 Ernst 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 Ernst?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ernst appears almost entirely male. Of the 2,686 people counted with this name, 99.8% 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 Ernst?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ernst is White at 52.4%. The next largest groups are Black (41.6%) and Hispanic (2.9%). 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 Ernst most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Ernst in the 2020 Census, accounting for 52.4% (1,410 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 Ernst in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ernst a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Ernst 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 Ernst still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ernst 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 Ernst 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 Americans are named Ernst?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.