Johan
A masculine name of Germanic origin meaning "God is gracious".
Name Census estimates that about 13,839 living Americans carry the first name Johan. It is a predominantly male name (99.1% of registrations). The average person named Johan today is around 17 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Johan births was 2016 (659 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Johan. 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 Johan with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Johan is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 135 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • Johan is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 17 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
14K
~ 1 in 24,767 Americans
Peak year
2016
659 babies that year
Average age
17
years old
2024 SSA rank
#536
Tracked since 1910
Census
Johan in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 15,880 people with the first name Johan, which placed it at #1,833 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
#1,833
National first-name rank
People counted
16K
15,880 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
5.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
69.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Johan
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Johan is Hispanic at 69.9%. The next largest groups are White (17.3%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (5.6%). 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 Johan 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 Johan at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino69.9% · 11,100
- White17.3% · 2,749
- Asian and Pacific Islander5.6% · 892
- Black or African American4.2% · 673
- Two or more races2.8% · 437
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.2% · 29
Gender
Gender distribution for Johan
Out of the 14,268 babies given the name Johan since 1880, 99.1% 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.
Johan as a male name
- Ranked #536 in 2024
- 554 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2016 (659 births)
Johan as a female name
- Ranked #16,408 in 2007
- 6 female births in 2007
- Peak: 1928 (9 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Johan leans strongly male. 15,448 people counted with this name were male (97.3%), compared with 435 female bearers (2.7%).
Popularity
Johan: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Johan from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 12 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 5,362 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Johan remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Johan 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 Johan during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Johans live
The SSA's state-level files cover 36 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Johan, while Mississippi, New Mexico, Kentucky recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 339 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Johan
The name Johan has its roots in the Hebrew name Yohanan, which means "Yahweh is gracious" or "Graced by God." It evolved from the Greek form Ioannes, which later became Johannes in Latin. Johan is the Scandinavian and Dutch form of this name.
In ancient times, the name Yohanan was quite common among the Israelites, and it appears several times in the Bible. One notable figure was John the Baptist, a Jewish preacher who baptized Jesus Christ in the River Jordan and is considered a prophet in Christianity and Islam.
The name Johan gained widespread popularity across Europe during the Middle Ages, particularly in Germanic and Scandinavian regions. One of the earliest recorded bearers of the name was Johan I, King of Sweden, who reigned from 1216 to 1222.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Johan. Johan Gutenberg (c. 1400-1468) was a German inventor credited with introducing the printing press to Europe, revolutionizing the dissemination of knowledge. Johan Huizinga (1872-1945) was a Dutch historian and philosopher who made significant contributions to the study of the Middle Ages.
The Renaissance period saw the rise of Johan Sebastian Bach (1685-1750), a German composer and musician widely regarded as one of the greatest composers of all time. His works, including the Brandenburg Concertos and the Well-Tempered Clavier, are considered masterpieces of the Baroque era.
In the realm of science, Johan Keppler (1571-1630) was a German astronomer and mathematician who formulated the laws of planetary motion, laying the foundations for Isaac Newton's theory of universal gravitation.
More recently, Johan Cruyff (1947-2016) was a Dutch professional football player and coach who revolutionized the sport with his innovative tactics and playing style, known as "Total Football."
Notable bearers
Famous people named Johan
People
Johan + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Johan as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with J
Other first names starting with J with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Johan: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Johan?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 13,839 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Johan 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 24,767 US residents.
Is Johan a common name?
We classify Johan as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.1% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 14,268 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Johan most popular?
The single biggest year for Johan was 2016, when 659 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Johan is about 17 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Johan in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 15,880 people with the name Johan, or 5.26 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,833 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 Johan 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 Johan?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Johan leans strongly male. 15,448 people counted with this name were male (97.3%), compared with 435 female bearers (2.7%). 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 Johan?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Johan is Hispanic at 69.9%. The next largest groups are White (17.3%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (5.6%). 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 Johan most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Johan in the 2020 Census, accounting for 69.9% (11,100 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 Johan in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Johan a male name?
Yes, 99.1% of people registered as Johan 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 Johan still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Johan 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 Johan 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 have the name Johan?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.