Abednego
Servant of Nego, a Babylonian deity.
Name Census estimates that about 102 living Americans carry the first name Abednego. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Abednego today is around 13 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Abednego births was 2018 (9 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Abednego. 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.
People living today
102
~ 1 in 3,360,337 Americans
Peak year
2018
9 babies that year
Average age
13
years old
2024 SSA rank
#10,910
Tracked since 2001
Census
Abednego in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 215 people with the first name Abednego, which placed it at #36,733 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
#36,733
National first-name rank
People counted
215
215 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
49.3% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Abednego
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Abednego is Black at 49.3%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (20.9%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (19.1%). 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 Abednego 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 Abednego at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American49.3% · 106
- Hispanic or Latino20.9% · 45
- Asian and Pacific Islander19.1% · 41
- White6.0% · 13
- Two or more races3.7% · 8
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.9% · 2
Popularity
Abednego: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Abednego from the 2000s through to the 2020s, spanning 3 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 38 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Abednego remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Abednego 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 Abednego during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Abednego
The given name Abednego has its origins in the Hebrew language and culture, dating back to ancient times. It is derived from the Hebrew words "Abed" meaning "servant" and "Nego" meaning "Nergal" or "Nabu," which were names of Babylonian deities. The name is believed to have been used during the period of the Babylonian captivity of the Israelites in the 6th century BC.
One of the earliest and most prominent historical references to the name Abednego can be found in the Book of Daniel in the Hebrew Bible. The book tells the story of three young Hebrew men, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, who were thrown into a fiery furnace for refusing to worship an idol, but were miraculously saved by divine intervention.
The first recorded use of the name Abednego dates back to this biblical account, which is estimated to have been written between the 6th and 4th centuries BC. Throughout history, the name has been used by various individuals, though it has remained relatively uncommon.
One notable figure named Abednego was Abednego Seller (1646-1705), an English dissenting minister and author who wrote several religious books and pamphlets. Another individual with this name was Abednego Tookerman (1786-1876), an American clergyman and author who served as a minister in various churches in New England.
In the 19th century, Abednego Ricketts (1818-1888) was a British Quaker missionary who worked in India and established several schools and institutions. Around the same time, Abednego Plant (1822-1892) was an English Quaker minister and author who wrote on religious and social issues.
More recently, Abednego Armstrong (1913-1994) was an American jazz drummer and bandleader who performed with notable artists like Louis Armstrong and Duke Ellington. Despite its biblical origins, the name Abednego has remained relatively uncommon throughout history, with only a few notable individuals bearing this unique and distinctive name.
People
Abednego + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Abednego as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Abednego: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Abednego?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 102 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Abednego 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 3,360,337 US residents.
Is Abednego a common name?
We classify Abednego as "Very Rare". It ranks above 64.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 103 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Abednego most popular?
The single biggest year for Abednego was 2018, when 9 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Abednego is about 13 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Abednego in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 215 people with the name Abednego, or 0.07 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #36,733 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 Abednego 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 Abednego?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Abednego appears almost entirely male. Of the 215 people counted with this name, 99.5% 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 Abednego?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Abednego is Black at 49.3%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (20.9%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (19.1%). 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 Abednego most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Abednego in the 2020 Census, accounting for 49.3% (106 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 Abednego in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Abednego a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Abednego 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 Abednego still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Abednego 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 Abednego 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 Abednego?
If you just want to know how many Americans are named Abednego, HowManyOfMe.org gives you the headline number in one glance.