Shahin
A Persian name meaning "royal falcon" or "falcon king".
Name Census estimates that about 310 living Americans carry the first name Shahin. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Shahin today is around 29 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Shahin births was 1989 (19 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Shahin. 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 Shahin with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
310
~ 1 in 1,105,659 Americans
Peak year
1989
19 babies that year
Average age
29
years old
2024 SSA rank
#12,086
Tracked since 1978
Census
Shahin in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,145 people with the first name Shahin, which placed it at #7,185 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
#7,185
National first-name rank
People counted
2.1K
2,145 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
70.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Shahin
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shahin is White at 70.7%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (17.2%) and Two or More Races (9.0%). 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 Shahin 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 Shahin at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White70.7% · 1,517
- Asian and Pacific Islander17.2% · 370
- Two or more races9.0% · 192
- Hispanic or Latino2.0% · 43
- Black or African American1.0% · 21
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.1% · 2
Popularity
Shahin: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Shahin from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 120 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1980s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Shahin 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 Shahin during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Shahins live
Origin
Meaning and history of Shahin
The name Shahin originated from the Persian language, and it is believed to have been derived from the Persian word "Shāhīn," which means "falcon" or "hawk." This name has a long and rich history, dating back to ancient Persia, which is now modern-day Iran.
One of the earliest recorded uses of the name Shahin can be found in the ancient Persian epic poem, the Shahnameh, written by the renowned poet Ferdowsi in the late 10th and early 11th centuries. In this epic, there are references to characters with the name Shahin, which was likely a common name among the Persian nobility and warriors of that time.
The name Shahin also has connections to Sufism, a mystical branch of Islam that originated in Persia. In Sufi literature and poetry, the falcon or hawk is often used as a symbolic representation of the human soul's journey towards spiritual enlightenment and union with the divine.
Throughout history, there have been several notable individuals who bore the name Shahin. One of the earliest recorded examples is Shahin Shirazi, a 13th-century Persian poet and scholar from the city of Shiraz. Another prominent figure was Shahin Bey, an Ottoman military leader and statesman who lived in the 16th century and played a crucial role in the Ottoman conquest of Baghdad.
In more recent times, Shahin Bayt-Al-Mal was an influential Egyptian writer and journalist who lived from 1909 to 1979 and was known for his literary works and advocacy for social justice. Additionally, Shahin Farouk Abdel Gawad was an Egyptian Olympic weightlifter who won a gold medal at the 1948 Summer Olympics in London.
Another notable individual with the name Shahin is Shahin Khalillullah, a Bangladeshi military officer and diplomat who served as the Chief of Army Staff of the Bangladesh Army from 1976 to 1979 and later as the Ambassador of Bangladesh to several countries.
The name Shahin has maintained its popularity and cultural significance in various parts of the world, particularly in the Middle East and Central Asia, where it continues to be a common name among Muslim communities with Persian cultural influences.
People
Shahin + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Shahin as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with S
Other first names starting with S with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Shahin: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Shahin?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 310 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Shahin 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 1,105,659 US residents.
Is Shahin a common name?
We classify Shahin as "Very Rare". It ranks above 79.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 319 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Shahin most popular?
The single biggest year for Shahin was 1989, when 19 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Shahin is about 29 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Shahin in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,145 people with the name Shahin, or 0.71 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #7,185 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 Shahin 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 Shahin?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Shahin on both sides of the split. Of the 2,143 people counted with this name, 1,141 were male (53.2%) and 1,002 were female (46.8%). 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 Shahin?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shahin is White at 70.7%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (17.2%) and Two or More Races (9.0%). 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 Shahin most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Shahin in the 2020 Census, accounting for 70.7% (1,517 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 Shahin in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Shahin a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Shahin 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 Shahin still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Shahin 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 Shahin 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 named Shahin?
Find out how many Americans are named Shahin on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org — a quick modern estimate with the living-bearer count front and centre.