Immanuel
A masculine name of Hebrew origin meaning "God with us".
Name Census estimates that about 5,866 living Americans carry the first name Immanuel. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Immanuel today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Immanuel births was 2015 (239 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Immanuel. 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 Immanuel with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
5.9K
~ 1 in 58,431 Americans
Peak year
2015
239 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,208
Tracked since 1917
Census
Immanuel in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 4,224 people with the first name Immanuel, which placed it at #4,434 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
#4,434
National first-name rank
People counted
4.2K
4,224 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
46.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Immanuel
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Immanuel is Black at 46.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (24.4%) and White (10.7%). 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 Immanuel 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 Immanuel at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American46.9% · 1,979
- Hispanic or Latino24.4% · 1,030
- White10.7% · 450
- Asian and Pacific Islander9.9% · 417
- Two or more races7.3% · 310
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.9% · 38
Popularity
Immanuel: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Immanuel from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 9 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 2,027 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Immanuel remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Immanuel 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 Immanuel during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Immanuels live
The SSA's state-level files cover 33 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Immanuel, while Oregon, Oklahoma, Nevada recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 116 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Immanuel
The name Immanuel is rooted in ancient Hebrew origins, derived from two words: "Immanu" meaning "with us" and "El" referring to God. This composite name translates to "God with us" or "God is with us." It first appeared in the Hebrew Bible, specifically in the Book of Isaiah, where it is prophesied as a symbolic name for the Messiah.
In the New Testament of the Christian Bible, the name Immanuel is associated with Jesus Christ, as the Gospel of Matthew refers to him as the fulfillment of the prophecy from Isaiah. This connection solidified the name's significance within the Christian tradition, where it came to represent the belief in the divine nature of Jesus as both human and the incarnation of God.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Immanuel can be found in the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, known as the Septuagint, dating back to the 3rd century BCE. Over the centuries, various spellings and variations of the name emerged, including Emmanuele, Emanuel, and Emmanuel, reflecting the linguistic influences of different regions and languages.
Historically, several notable figures have borne the name Immanuel. One of the earliest was Immanuel ben Jacob (c. 1268-1335), a celebrated Jewish philosopher and scholar from Catalonia, Spain. Another prominent figure was Immanuel Tremellius (1510-1580), an Italian Renaissance scholar and Hebrew linguist who contributed to the translation of the Bible into Latin.
In the realm of philosophy, Immanuel Kant (1724-1804), the renowned German philosopher, is perhaps the most famous bearer of the name. His groundbreaking works, such as the "Critique of Pure Reason," had a profound impact on modern Western philosophy and epistemology.
Another significant figure was Immanuel Velikovsky (1895-1979), a Russian-born Jewish scholar who challenged conventional theories in the fields of astronomy, ancient history, and catastrophism, sparking controversies and debates within the scientific community.
Immanuel Jakobovits (1921-1999), born in Germany, was a prominent Orthodox Rabbi who served as the Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth from 1967 to 1980, making important contributions to Jewish life and interfaith relations in the United Kingdom.
People
Immanuel + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Immanuel as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with I
Other first names starting with I with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Immanuel: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Immanuel?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 5,866 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Immanuel 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 58,431 US residents.
Is Immanuel a common name?
We classify Immanuel as "Rare". It ranks above 96.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 5,973 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Immanuel most popular?
The single biggest year for Immanuel was 2015, when 239 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Immanuel is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Immanuel in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 4,224 people with the name Immanuel, or 1.40 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #4,434 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 Immanuel 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 Immanuel?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Immanuel appears almost entirely male. Of the 4,225 people counted with this name, 99.5% 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 Immanuel?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Immanuel is Black at 46.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (24.4%) and White (10.7%). 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 Immanuel most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Immanuel in the 2020 Census, accounting for 46.9% (1,979 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 Immanuel in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Immanuel a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Immanuel 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 Immanuel still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Immanuel 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 Immanuel 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 Immanuel?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.