Latanya
Feminine name of disputed origin, possibly from Spanish.
Name Census estimates that about 8,767 living Americans carry the first name Latanya. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Latanya today is around 51 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Latanya births was 1972 (520 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Latanya. 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 Latanya with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
8.8K
~ 1 in 39,096 Americans
Peak year
1972
520 babies that year
Average age
51
years old
1982 SSA rank
#6,942
Tracked since 1947
Census
Latanya in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 7,292 people with the first name Latanya, which placed it at #3,042 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
#3,042
National first-name rank
People counted
7.3K
7,292 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
2.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
91.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Latanya
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Latanya is Black at 91.0%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (3.0%) and White (2.4%). 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 Latanya 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 Latanya at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American91.0% · 6,636
- Two or more races3.0% · 219
- White2.4% · 173
- Hispanic or Latino1.9% · 140
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.5% · 106
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.2% · 18
Gender
Gender distribution for Latanya
Out of the 9,873 babies given the name Latanya since 1880, 99.8% were registered as female. The name sits firmly on the female side of the spectrum, with only a handful of male registrations across the entire dataset.
Latanya as a male name
- Ranked #6,942 in 1982
- 5 male births in 1982
- Peak: 1971 (7 births)
Latanya as a female name
- Ranked #14,381 in 2023
- 6 female births in 2023
- Peak: 1972 (520 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Latanya appears almost entirely female. Of the 7,290 people counted with this name, 99.9% were female and only a very small share were male.
Popularity
Latanya: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Latanya from the 1940s through to the 2020s, spanning 9 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1970s, with 4,668 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1970s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Latanya 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 Latanya during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Latanyas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 31 states and territories. California, Illinois, New York recorded the most babies named Latanya, while Oklahoma, Nevada, Massachusetts recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 265 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Latanya
The name Latanya has its origins in the African language of Yoruba, spoken primarily in modern-day Nigeria. It is believed to have emerged during the late 16th or early 17th century. The name is derived from the Yoruba words "ola" meaning wealth or fortune, and "tanni" meaning to spread or distribute. Together, Latanya can be interpreted as "one who spreads wealth or fortune."
In the Yoruba culture, names often carried deep symbolic meaning and were carefully chosen to reflect the hopes and aspirations of the parents for their child. The name Latanya was likely bestowed upon babies with the intention of blessing them with prosperity and the ability to share their good fortune with others.
While no specific historical references to the name Latanya have been found in ancient texts or religious scriptures, it is possible that the name was in use among the Yoruba people before written records were kept. The earliest recorded instances of the name appear to be from the 19th century, as the transatlantic slave trade brought many Yoruba people and their cultural traditions to the Americas.
One of the earliest known individuals named Latanya was Latanya Boudreaux, born in 1832 in Louisiana, USA. She was a former slave who became a respected community leader and advocate for education after the Civil War.
Another notable Latanya was Latanya Richardson Jackson, an American actress born in 1949. She is best known for her roles in television shows such as "The Temptations" and "Trapped in the Closet."
In the world of sports, Latanya Sheffield (born 1972) was a successful American track and field athlete, specializing in the long jump and triple jump events. She won multiple medals at various international competitions.
Latanya Graves (born 1982) is an American attorney and former basketball player who played professionally in the WNBA for several teams, including the Sacramento Monarchs and the Indiana Fever.
Latanya Sweeney (born 1970) is a distinguished computer scientist and data privacy researcher. She is known for her groundbreaking work on data anonymization and the concept of k-anonymity, which has had a significant impact on the field of privacy-preserving data mining.
These are just a few examples of notable individuals throughout history who have borne the name Latanya, reflecting its rich cultural heritage and the diverse paths taken by those who carry this name.
People
Latanya + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Latanya as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with L
Other first names starting with L with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Latanya: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Latanya?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 8,767 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Latanya 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 39,096 US residents.
Is Latanya a common name?
We classify Latanya as "Rare". It ranks above 97.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 9,873 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Latanya most popular?
The single biggest year for Latanya was 1972, when 520 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Latanya is about 51 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Latanya in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 7,292 people with the name Latanya, or 2.41 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #3,042 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 Latanya 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 Latanya?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Latanya appears almost entirely female. Of the 7,290 people counted with this name, 99.9% were female and only a very small share were male. 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 Latanya?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Latanya is Black at 91.0%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (3.0%) and White (2.4%). 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 Latanya most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Latanya in the 2020 Census, accounting for 91.0% (6,636 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 Latanya in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Latanya a female name?
Yes, 99.8% of people registered as Latanya in the SSA data are female. 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 Latanya still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Latanya 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 Latanya 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 Latanya?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.