Keaton
A masculine name of English origin meaning "warrior's meadow".
Name Census estimates that about 22,734 living Americans carry the first name Keaton. It is a predominantly male name (94.2% of registrations). The average person named Keaton today is around 20 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Keaton births was 2007 (930 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Keaton. 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 Keaton with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
23K
~ 1 in 15,077 Americans
Peak year
2007
930 babies that year
Average age
20
years old
2024 SSA rank
#843
Tracked since 1925
Census
Keaton in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 19,692 people with the first name Keaton, which placed it at #1,617 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
#1,617
National first-name rank
People counted
20K
19,692 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
6.5
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
83.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Keaton
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Keaton is White at 83.1%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (6.1%) and Black (4.3%). 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 Keaton 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 Keaton at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White83.1% · 16,363
- Two or more races6.1% · 1,204
- Black or African American4.3% · 856
- Hispanic or Latino4.1% · 803
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.3% · 247
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.1% · 219
Gender
Gender distribution for Keaton
Keaton leans heavily male at 94.2% of total registrations, but 1,331 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Keaton as a male name
- Ranked #843 in 2024
- 288 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2007 (881 births)
Keaton as a female name
- Ranked #4,940 in 2024
- 27 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2004 (59 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Keaton leans strongly male. 18,501 people counted with this name were male (94.0%), compared with 1,187 female bearers (6.0%).
Popularity
Keaton: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Keaton from the 1920s through to the 2020s, spanning 8 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 8,196 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Keaton 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 Keaton during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Keatons live
The SSA's state-level files cover 45 states and territories. Texas, California, Indiana recorded the most babies named Keaton, while New Hampshire, Alaska, Connecticut recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 450 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Keaton
The name Keaton is an English surname that has been adopted as a given name. It is derived from the Old English words "kete" and "tun," which together mean "farmstead where they make keats or coarse cloth." The name first appeared in the late 12th century as a surname in Yorkshire, England.
The earliest known bearer of the name Keaton was a landowner in Yorkshire named Richard de Keton, recorded in 1208. In the 13th century, the name was also found in Cheshire and Staffordshire, suggesting it may have originated from multiple places.
One of the earliest notable people with the name Keaton was Sir John Keeton (or Keaton), a 14th-century English knight who fought in the Hundred Years' War. He was knighted by Edward III in 1346 for his service at the Battle of Crécy.
In the 16th century, the name appears in religious records, such as the baptism of Thomas Keaton in 1569 in Swinton, Lancashire. During this time, variations like Keeton, Keton, and Keyton were also used.
The name gained wider recognition in the 20th century with the fame of the American actor and filmmaker Buster Keaton (1895-1966). Born Joseph Frank Keaton, he was a pioneer of physical comedy and starred in many silent films.
Other notable people with the first name Keaton include Keaton Simons (born 1977), an American artist and filmmaker; Keaton Ellerby (born 1989), a Canadian professional ice hockey player; and Keaton Jennings (born 1992), an English cricketer.
One of the earliest fictional characters with the name was Keaton, a character in the 1936 novel "Gone with the Wind" by Margaret Mitchell. The name has since been used for various fictional characters in films, TV shows, and literature.
People
Keaton + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Keaton 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
Keaton: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Keaton?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 22,734 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Keaton 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 15,077 US residents.
Is Keaton a common name?
We classify Keaton as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 23,080 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Keaton most popular?
The single biggest year for Keaton was 2007, when 930 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Keaton is about 20 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Keaton in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 19,692 people with the name Keaton, or 6.52 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,617 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 Keaton 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 Keaton?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Keaton leans strongly male. 18,501 people counted with this name were male (94.0%), compared with 1,187 female bearers (6.0%). 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 Keaton?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Keaton is White at 83.1%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (6.1%) and Black (4.3%). 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 Keaton most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Keaton in the 2020 Census, accounting for 83.1% (16,363 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 Keaton in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Keaton a male name?
Yes, 94.2% of people registered as Keaton 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 Keaton still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Keaton 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 Keaton 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 Keaton as a first name?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.