Yehoshua
A masculine Hebrew name meaning "God is salvation" or "Yahweh saves".
Name Census estimates that about 2,310 living Americans carry the first name Yehoshua. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Yehoshua today is around 19 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Yehoshua births was 2019 (95 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Yehoshua. 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 Yehoshua with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
2.3K
~ 1 in 148,379 Americans
Peak year
2019
95 babies that year
Average age
19
years old
2024 SSA rank
#2,148
Tracked since 1970
Census
Yehoshua in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,798 people with the first name Yehoshua, which placed it at #8,137 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
#8,137
National first-name rank
People counted
1.8K
1,798 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.6
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
91.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Yehoshua
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Yehoshua is White at 91.2%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (4.9%) and Black (2.3%). 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 Yehoshua 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 Yehoshua at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White91.2% · 1,640
- Hispanic or Latino4.9% · 88
- Black or African American2.3% · 41
- Two or more races0.9% · 17
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.7% · 12
Popularity
Yehoshua: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Yehoshua from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 778 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Yehoshua remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Yehoshua 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 Yehoshua during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Yehoshuas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 6 states and territories. New York, New Jersey, California recorded the most babies named Yehoshua, while Texas, Illinois, Florida recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 295 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Yehoshua
The name Yehoshua is a Hebrew name that originated in ancient Israel. It is derived from the Hebrew words "Yeho" meaning "Yahweh" and "shua" meaning "salvation" or "deliverance". The name can be translated as "Yahweh is salvation" or "Yahweh saves".
Yehoshua is the original Hebrew name of Joshua, a figure who is prominent in the Bible's Old Testament. He was a leader of the Israelites and succeeded Moses as the one who led the Israelites across the Jordan River and into the Promised Land of Canaan. The Book of Joshua in the Hebrew Bible recounts his life and military campaigns.
One of the earliest known examples of the name Yehoshua is found in the Book of Numbers in the Bible, where it refers to Joshua, son of Nun, who was appointed by Moses as his successor. This Joshua lived around the 13th century BCE.
Throughout history, there have been several notable figures who bore the name Yehoshua or its variants. One of the most famous was Yehoshua ben Perahyah, a Jewish scholar who lived in the 2nd century BCE and was the president of the Sanhedrin, the highest court of ancient Israel.
Another well-known bearer of the name was Yehoshua ben Hananiah, a Jewish scholar who lived in the 1st century CE and is credited with establishing the Hebrew calendar still used today.
In the 16th century, there was Yehoshua Halorki, a prominent rabbi and Talmudic scholar who lived in Poland and wrote several influential works on Jewish law and Kabbalah.
Yehoshua Salanter, who lived from 1810 to 1883, was a prominent rabbi and one of the founders of the Musar movement, which aimed to promote ethical behavior and character development among Jews.
These are just a few examples of notable figures throughout history who bore the name Yehoshua, which has its roots in ancient Hebrew and biblical tradition.
People
Yehoshua + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Yehoshua as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with Y
Other first names starting with Y with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Yehoshua: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Yehoshua?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,310 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Yehoshua 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 148,379 US residents.
Is Yehoshua a common name?
We classify Yehoshua as "Rare". It ranks above 94.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,348 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Yehoshua most popular?
The single biggest year for Yehoshua was 2019, when 95 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Yehoshua is about 19 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Yehoshua in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,798 people with the name Yehoshua, or 0.60 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #8,137 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 Yehoshua 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 Yehoshua?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Yehoshua appears almost entirely male. Of the 1,798 people counted with this name, 100.0% were male and only a very small share were female. 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 Yehoshua?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Yehoshua is White at 91.2%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (4.9%) and Black (2.3%). 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 Yehoshua most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Yehoshua in the 2020 Census, accounting for 91.2% (1,640 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 Yehoshua in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Yehoshua a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Yehoshua 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 Yehoshua still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Yehoshua 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 Yehoshua 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 Yehoshua?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.