Maud
Feminine name of Old German origin meaning "mighty in battle".
Name Census estimates that about 549 living Americans carry the first name Maud. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Maud today is around 80 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Maud births was 1886 (483 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Maud. 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 Maud with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • The typical person named Maud is about 80 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Mauds were born before 1956.
People living today
549
~ 1 in 624,325 Americans
Peak year
1886
483 babies that year
Average age
80
years old
1908 SSA rank
#1,529
Tracked since 1880
Census
Maud in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,280 people with the first name Maud, which placed it at #10,432 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
#10,432
National first-name rank
People counted
1.3K
1,280 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
54.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Maud
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Maud is White at 54.7%. The next largest groups are Black (36.2%) and Hispanic (3.6%). 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 Maud 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 Maud at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White54.7% · 700
- Black or African American36.2% · 463
- Hispanic or Latino3.6% · 46
- Two or more races3.2% · 41
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.1% · 27
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.2% · 3
Gender
Gender distribution for Maud
Out of the 13,190 babies given the name Maud 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.
Maud as a male name
- Ranked #1,529 in 1908
- 5 male births in 1908
- Peak: 1881 (6 births)
Maud as a female name
- Ranked #14,595 in 2024
- 6 female births in 2024
- Peak: 1886 (478 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Maud leans strongly female. 1,262 people counted with this name were female (98.4%), compared with 20 male bearers (1.6%).
Popularity
Maud: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Maud from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1880s, with 4,222 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1880s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Maud 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 Maud during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Mauds live
The SSA's state-level files cover 24 states and territories. Texas, Mississippi, Louisiana recorded the most babies named Maud, while West Virginia, New Jersey, Kansas recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 90 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Maud
The name Maud is a female given name of English and French origin, derived from the Germanic name Mahthildis or Mathilde, which is composed of the elements "maht" meaning "might" or "strength" and "hild" meaning "battle." The name Maud emerged as a contracted form of Mahthildis in the Middle Ages.
The earliest known historical reference to the name Maud can be found in the 11th century, when it was borne by Matilda of Flanders (c. 1031–1083), the wife of William the Conqueror, the first Norman King of England. She was a powerful and influential figure in her own right and played a significant role in the Norman conquest of England.
Another notable Maud in history was Matilda of England (1102–1167), also known as the Empress Maud or Maud the Empressed. She was the daughter of King Henry I of England and claimed the English throne during a civil war known as "The Anarchy." Although she was never officially crowned, she was recognized as the Lady of the English for a brief period.
In the 13th century, Maud de Braose (c. 1224–1301) was a wealthy English heiress and landowner. She was involved in a famous court case regarding her right to inherit her father's estates, which set an important legal precedent for women's inheritance rights.
During the 14th century, Maud of Lancaster (1340–1362) was an English noblewoman and the first wife of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. She was the mother of King Henry IV of England and the grandmother of King Henry V.
In the 15th century, Maud Green (c. 1492–1556) was an English Protestant martyr who was burned at the stake for her religious beliefs during the Marian persecutions under the reign of Queen Mary I.
The name Maud has been popular among English and French royalty, nobility, and historical figures throughout the centuries, reflecting its association with strength, power, and resilience.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Maud
People
Maud + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Maud as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with M
Other first names starting with M with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Maud: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Maud?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 549 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Maud 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 624,325 US residents.
Is Maud a common name?
We classify Maud as "Very Rare". It ranks above 85.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 13,190 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Maud most popular?
The single biggest year for Maud was 1886, when 483 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Maud is about 80 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Maud in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,280 people with the name Maud, or 0.42 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #10,432 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 Maud 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 Maud?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Maud leans strongly female. 1,262 people counted with this name were female (98.4%), compared with 20 male bearers (1.6%). 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 Maud?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Maud is White at 54.7%. The next largest groups are Black (36.2%) and Hispanic (3.6%). 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 Maud most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Maud in the 2020 Census, accounting for 54.7% (700 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 Maud in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Maud a female name?
Yes, 99.8% of people registered as Maud 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 Maud still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Maud 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 Maud 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 share the name Maud?
Want to know how many Americans are named Maud? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.