Miller
One who works at a mill or grain producer.
Name Census estimates that about 10,060 living Americans carry the first name Miller. It sits at #438 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 82.2% of registrations being male. The average person named Miller today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Miller births was 2024 (1,093 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Miller. 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 Miller with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Miller is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 18 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
10K
~ 1 in 34,071 Americans
Peak year
2024
1,093 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2024 SSA rank
#438
Tracked since 1880
Census
Miller in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 6,884 people with the first name Miller, which placed it at #3,162 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
#3,162
National first-name rank
People counted
6.9K
6,884 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
2.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
78.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Miller
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Miller is White at 78.8%. The next largest groups are Black (9.0%) and Hispanic (6.0%). 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 Miller 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 Miller at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White78.8% · 5,422
- Black or African American9.0% · 621
- Hispanic or Latino6.0% · 414
- Two or more races3.1% · 214
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.6% · 178
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.5% · 35
Gender
Gender distribution for Miller
Miller leans heavily male at 82.2% of total registrations, but 2,235 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Miller as a male name
- Ranked #438 in 2024
- 721 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (721 births)
Miller as a female name
- Ranked #757 in 2024
- 372 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (372 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Miller leans strongly male. 5,571 people counted with this name were male (81.0%), compared with 1,308 female bearers (19.0%).
Popularity
Miller: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Miller from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2020s, with 3,776 total registrations. The name continues to be given at rates close to its all-time high, suggesting it has not yet fallen out of fashion.
Babies born per year
Decades
Miller 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 Miller during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Millers live
The SSA's state-level files cover 42 states and territories. Texas, Georgia, North Carolina recorded the most babies named Miller, while Vermont, New Mexico, South Dakota recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 174 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Miller
The given name Miller is an occupational surname originating from Old English and originally referred to a person who worked as a miller, grinding grain at a mill. The name is derived from the Old English word "mylnere," which itself comes from the Proto-Germanic word "mulinarjaz." This was formed by combining the words "mulino" (mill) and the suffix "-arjaz" (agent).
The name Miller first emerged in England and surrounding areas during the Anglo-Saxon period, which lasted from the 5th to the 11th century. It was one of the earliest English occupational surnames to develop. Similar spellings in early records include Millere, Milner, and Mylner.
While not found in ancient religious texts or scriptures, the name Miller does appear in various historical records and documents from medieval England. One of the earliest recorded instances is a man named William le Millere, mentioned in the Assize Rolls of Gloucestershire in 1221.
Several notable individuals throughout history have borne the first name Miller. In the 18th century, Miller Mundy (1725-1784) was an English politician who served as Member of Parliament for Derbyshire. Author and playwright Miller Browne (1831-1907) was a prominent figure in the literary world of 19th century England.
In the United States, Miller Huggins (1879-1929) was a baseball player and manager who led the New York Yankees to their first World Series championship in 1923. Miller Williams (1930-2015) was an American contemporary poet and translator who served as the inaugural inaugural poet at President Clinton's second inauguration in 1997.
Another notable bearer of the name was Miller Reese Hutchison (1876-1944), an American engineer and inventor best known for developing an innovative hearing aid design in the early 20th century.
People
Miller + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Miller 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
Miller: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Miller?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 10,060 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Miller 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 34,071 US residents.
Is Miller a common name?
We classify Miller as "Uncommon". It ranks above 97.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 12,541 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Miller most popular?
The single biggest year for Miller was 2024, when 1,093 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Miller is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Miller in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 6,884 people with the name Miller, or 2.28 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #3,162 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 Miller 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 Miller?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Miller leans strongly male. 5,571 people counted with this name were male (81.0%), compared with 1,308 female bearers (19.0%). 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 Miller?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Miller is White at 78.8%. The next largest groups are Black (9.0%) and Hispanic (6.0%). 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 Miller most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Miller in the 2020 Census, accounting for 78.8% (5,422 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 Miller in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Miller a male name?
Yes, 82.2% of people registered as Miller 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 Miller still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Miller 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 Miller 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 common is the name Miller?
See how many people have the name Miller on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.