Lonnie
A masculine name of French origin meaning "the little lion".
Name Census estimates that about 60,933 living Americans carry the first name Lonnie. It is a predominantly male name (93.1% of registrations). The average person named Lonnie today is around 61 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Lonnie births was 1947 (2,236 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Lonnie. 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 Lonnie with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Compared to the 1950s, recent registration numbers for Lonnie have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
61K
~ 1 in 5,625 Americans
Peak year
1947
2,236 babies that year
Average age
61
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,822
Tracked since 1880
Census
Lonnie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 51,395 people with the first name Lonnie, which placed it at #880 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
#880
National first-name rank
People counted
51K
51,395 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
17.0
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
68.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Lonnie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Lonnie is White at 68.0%. The next largest groups are Black (24.0%) and Two or More Races (3.5%). 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 Lonnie 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 Lonnie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White68.0% · 34,969
- Black or African American24.0% · 12,342
- Two or more races3.5% · 1,792
- Hispanic or Latino2.6% · 1,325
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.3% · 658
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.6% · 309
Gender
Gender distribution for Lonnie
Lonnie leans heavily male at 93.1% of total registrations, but 6,972 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Lonnie as a male name
- Ranked #1,822 in 2024
- 89 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1947 (2,085 births)
Lonnie as a female name
- Ranked #5,362 in 2024
- 24 female births in 2024
- Peak: 1947 (151 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Lonnie leans strongly male. 48,047 people counted with this name were male (93.5%), compared with 3,349 female bearers (6.5%).
Popularity
Lonnie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Lonnie from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1950s, with 20,347 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1950s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Lonnie 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 Lonnie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Lonnies live
The SSA's state-level files cover 48 states and territories. Texas, North Carolina, Georgia recorded the most babies named Lonnie, while Vermont, Delaware, Alaska recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 1,879 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Lonnie
The name Lonnie is an English diminutive form of the name Lon, which itself is a shortened version of the name Lancelot. The name Lancelot is derived from the French name Lancelin, which itself comes from the ancient Germanic elements "lanc" meaning "land" or "territory" and "lind" meaning "serpent" or "dragon."
The earliest known bearer of the name Lancelot was a 12th-century knight associated with the legends of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. In the Arthurian tales, Lancelot is depicted as one of Arthur's greatest knights and becomes embroiled in an affair with Queen Guinevere. The name Lancelot gained widespread popularity in Europe during the Middle Ages due to these romanticized stories.
One of the earliest recorded individuals with the name Lonnie was Lonnie Rashid Lynn Jr. (1913-1986), an American jazz drummer and singer better known by his stage name, Lonnie Donegan. He is credited with helping to popularize skiffle music in the 1950s and influencing many British artists, including The Beatles.
Another notable Lonnie was Lonnie Johnson (1899-1970), an American blues and jazz singer, guitarist, and songwriter who was a pioneering figure in the development of jazz guitar. His influential recordings from the 1920s and 1930s inspired many future musicians.
Lonnie Liston Smith (born 1940) is an American jazz pianist and composer who has recorded several albums and is known for his spiritual and cosmic-themed compositions. He was a member of the jazz fusion group Spiral Starecase in the 1970s.
Lonnie Rashid Lynn (born 1972), better known by his stage name Common, is an American rapper, actor, and activist who has released several critically acclaimed albums and has won numerous awards, including a Grammy and an Academy Award.
Lonnie Brooks (1933-2017) was an American blues singer, guitarist, and songwriter who was a prominent figure in the Chicago blues scene and was known for his distinctive guitar style and powerful vocals.
People
Lonnie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Lonnie 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
Lonnie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Lonnie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 60,933 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Lonnie 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 5,625 US residents.
Is Lonnie a common name?
We classify Lonnie 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, 101,366 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Lonnie most popular?
The single biggest year for Lonnie was 1947, when 2,236 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Lonnie is about 61 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Lonnie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 51,395 people with the name Lonnie, or 17.02 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #880 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 Lonnie 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 Lonnie?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Lonnie leans strongly male. 48,047 people counted with this name were male (93.5%), compared with 3,349 female bearers (6.5%). 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 Lonnie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Lonnie is White at 68.0%. The next largest groups are Black (24.0%) and Two or More Races (3.5%). 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 Lonnie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Lonnie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 68.0% (34,969 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 Lonnie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Lonnie a male name?
Yes, 93.1% of people registered as Lonnie 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 Lonnie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Lonnie 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 Lonnie 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 Americans are named Lonnie?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many Americans are named Lonnie at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.