Arnett
A masculine name possibly derived from an Old English surname meaning "eagle strength".
Name Census estimates that about 632 living Americans carry the first name Arnett. It is a predominantly male name (94.5% of registrations). The average person named Arnett today is around 65 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Arnett births was 1951 (35 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Arnett. 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
632
~ 1 in 542,333 Americans
Peak year
1951
35 babies that year
Average age
65
years old
2006 SSA rank
#7,074
Tracked since 1893
Census
Arnett in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 681 people with the first name Arnett, which placed it at #16,519 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
#16,519
National first-name rank
People counted
681
681 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
68.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Arnett
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Arnett is Black at 68.6%. The next largest groups are White (23.6%) and Two or More Races (3.7%). 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 Arnett 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 Arnett at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American68.6% · 467
- White23.6% · 161
- Two or more races3.7% · 25
- Hispanic or Latino2.3% · 16
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.6% · 11
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.1% · 1
Gender
Gender distribution for Arnett
Arnett leans heavily male at 94.5% of total registrations, but 75 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Arnett as a male name
- Ranked #9,653 in 2006
- 7 male births in 2006
- Peak: 1951 (35 births)
Arnett as a female name
- Ranked #7,074 in 1968
- 5 female births in 1968
- Peak: 1959 (10 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Arnett leans strongly male. 569 people counted with this name were male (83.3%), compared with 114 female bearers (16.7%).
Popularity
Arnett: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Arnett from the 1890s through to the 2000s, spanning 12 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1950s, with 250 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1950s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Arnett 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 Arnett during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Arnetts live
The SSA's state-level files cover 6 states and territories. West Virginia, New York, Georgia recorded the most babies named Arnett, while Oklahoma, Mississippi, Kentucky recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 15 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Arnett
The name Arnett is an English given name derived from the Old French word "arn", meaning eagle. It originated in the Middle Ages, around the 12th or 13th century, and was initially used as a surname for those who either worked with eagles or lived in an area associated with these majestic birds.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Arnett can be found in the Domesday Book, a comprehensive record of landowners in England compiled in 1086 by order of William the Conqueror. Here, it appears as "Arnulf," a variant spelling of the same name.
In the 14th century, the name Arnett gained popularity among the English nobility and upper classes, who often chose names with French origins to reflect their status and connections to the Norman aristocracy. One notable figure from this era was Arnett de Mandeville, a English knight who fought in the Hundred Years' War against France in the mid-1300s.
The name Arnett also has roots in biblical tradition, as it shares similarities with the Hebrew name "Arnon," which appears in the Book of Numbers and refers to a river in the region of Moab. However, there is no direct connection between the two names, and the English version is more closely tied to its French origins.
During the Renaissance period, the name Arnett experienced a resurgence in popularity, particularly among the educated and artistic classes. One famous bearer of the name from this time was Arnett de Vinci, an Italian painter and sculptor who lived in the late 15th and early 16th centuries and was a contemporary of the renowned Leonardo da Vinci.
In the 19th century, the name Arnett gained traction in the United States, likely due to the influx of English and French immigrants during this period. One notable American named Arnett was Arnett Beecher, a prominent abolitionist and women's rights activist who lived from 1811 to 1878 and was a cousin of the famous writer Harriet Beecher Stowe.
People
Arnett + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Arnett 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
Arnett: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Arnett?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 632 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Arnett 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 542,333 US residents.
Is Arnett a common name?
We classify Arnett as "Very Rare". It ranks above 86.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 1,373 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Arnett most popular?
The single biggest year for Arnett was 1951, when 35 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Arnett is about 65 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Arnett in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 681 people with the name Arnett, or 0.23 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #16,519 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 Arnett 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 Arnett?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Arnett leans strongly male. 569 people counted with this name were male (83.3%), compared with 114 female bearers (16.7%). 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 Arnett?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Arnett is Black at 68.6%. The next largest groups are White (23.6%) and Two or More Races (3.7%). 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 Arnett most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Arnett in the 2020 Census, accounting for 68.6% (467 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 Arnett in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Arnett a male name?
Yes, 94.5% of people registered as Arnett 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 Arnett still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Arnett 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 Arnett 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 Americans are named Arnett?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.