Karl
A Germanic masculine name deriving from the Old Norse "karl" meaning "man, husband".
Name Census estimates that about 69,799 living Americans carry the first name Karl. It is a predominantly male name (99.1% of registrations). The average person named Karl today is around 56 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Karl births was 1960 (2,614 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Karl. 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 Karl with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Karl is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 915 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • Compared to the 1960s, recent registration numbers for Karl have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
70K
~ 1 in 4,911 Americans
Peak year
1960
2,614 babies that year
Average age
56
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,688
Tracked since 1880
Census
Karl in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 73,523 people with the first name Karl, which placed it at #700 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
#700
National first-name rank
People counted
74K
73,523 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
24.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
80.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Karl
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Karl is White at 80.7%. The next largest groups are Black (10.6%) and Hispanic (3.1%). 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 Karl 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 Karl at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White80.7% · 59,366
- Black or African American10.6% · 7,768
- Hispanic or Latino3.1% · 2,264
- Two or more races2.6% · 1,913
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.5% · 1,870
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.5% · 342
Gender
Gender distribution for Karl
Out of the 101,648 babies given the name Karl 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.
Karl as a male name
- Ranked #1,688 in 2024
- 99 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1960 (2,594 births)
Karl as a female name
- Ranked #9,091 in 1993
- 9 female births in 1993
- Peak: 1969 (37 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Karl appears almost entirely male. Of the 73,518 people counted with this name, 99.7% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Karl: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Karl from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1960s, with 21,408 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
Karl 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 Karl during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Karls live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. New York, California, Pennsylvania recorded the most babies named Karl, while Wyoming, Nevada, Vermont recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 1,860 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Karl
The name Karl is derived from the Germanic word "karl" which means "man" or "freeman." It originated in the 8th century and was initially a title used to refer to someone of free birth or higher social status. Over time, it evolved into a personal name.
The name gained widespread popularity across Europe due to its association with Charlemagne, the ruler of the Frankish Empire from 768 to 814 AD. Charlemagne, also known as Charles the Great or Carolus Magnus in Latin, played a pivotal role in the spread of Christianity and the preservation of ancient learning during the Middle Ages.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Karl can be found in the Nibelungenlied, a legendary German epic poem from around the 13th century. The poem mentions a character named Karl, who is believed to be a representation of Charlemagne.
Throughout history, several notable figures have borne the name Karl. One of the most famous is Karl Marx (1818-1883), the German philosopher and economist whose ideas laid the foundation for Marxism and communism. Another prominent individual was Karl Benz (1844-1929), the German automotive pioneer who patented the first gasoline-powered automobile in 1886.
Other significant figures with the name Karl include Karl Landsteiner (1868-1943), the Austrian-American biologist and physician who discovered the major blood groups and won the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1930. Karl Jaspers (1883-1969) was a German philosopher and psychiatrist who made significant contributions to existentialism and phenomenology.
Additionally, Karl Pearson (1857-1936) was an English mathematician and philosopher who established the discipline of mathematical statistics and developed several statistical techniques, including the chi-squared test and the Pearson correlation coefficient.
The name Karl has been widely used across various cultures and regions, particularly in Germanic and Scandinavian countries, where it has maintained its popularity over the centuries.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Karl
People
Karl + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Karl as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with K
Other first names starting with K with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Karl: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Karl?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 69,799 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Karl 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 4,911 US residents.
Is Karl a common name?
We classify Karl as "Uncommon". It ranks above 99.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 101,648 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Karl most popular?
The single biggest year for Karl was 1960, when 2,614 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Karl 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 Karl in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 73,523 people with the name Karl, or 24.34 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #700 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 Karl 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 Karl?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Karl appears almost entirely male. Of the 73,518 people counted with this name, 99.7% 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 Karl?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Karl is White at 80.7%. The next largest groups are Black (10.6%) and Hispanic (3.1%). 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 Karl most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Karl in the 2020 Census, accounting for 80.7% (59,366 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 Karl in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Karl a male name?
Yes, 99.1% of people registered as Karl 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 Karl still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Karl 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 Karl 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 Karl?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.