Colby
From an Old English name meaning "coal settlement" or "dark town".
Name Census estimates that about 55,946 living Americans carry the first name Colby. It is a predominantly male name (92.8% of registrations). The average person named Colby today is around 27 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Colby births was 2001 (3,979 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Colby. 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 Colby with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
56K
~ 1 in 6,127 Americans
Peak year
2001
3,979 babies that year
Average age
27
years old
2024 SSA rank
#582
Tracked since 1888
Census
Colby in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 49,557 people with the first name Colby, which placed it at #908 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
#908
National first-name rank
People counted
50K
49,557 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
16.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
85.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Colby
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Colby is White at 85.0%. The next largest groups are Black (4.9%) and Two or More Races (4.3%). 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 Colby 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 Colby at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White85.0% · 42,130
- Black or African American4.9% · 2,422
- Two or more races4.3% · 2,138
- Hispanic or Latino3.7% · 1,851
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 524
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.0% · 492
Gender
Gender distribution for Colby
Colby leans heavily male at 92.8% of total registrations, but 4,123 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Colby as a male name
- Ranked #582 in 2024
- 489 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2001 (3,859 births)
Colby as a female name
- Ranked #3,225 in 2024
- 49 female births in 2024
- Peak: 1992 (155 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Colby leans strongly male. 45,954 people counted with this name were male (92.7%), compared with 3,599 female bearers (7.3%).
Popularity
Colby: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Colby from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 13 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 20,040 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Colby 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 Colby during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Colbys live
The SSA's state-level files cover 50 states and territories. Texas, California, Florida recorded the most babies named Colby, while Alaska, North Dakota, Wyoming recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 1,051 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Colby
The name Colby originated from an Old Norse word "kolbrandr," which translates to "coal-brand" or "coal-burned." This name was likely given to individuals with dark complexions or those who worked with coal or in forges. The name's roots can be traced back to the Viking Age, around the 8th to 11th centuries, when Norse settlers inhabited parts of modern-day England, Scotland, and Ireland.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Colby can be found in the Domesday Book, a manuscript record of the great survey of England commissioned by William the Conqueror in 1086. The name appears as "Colbrand," referring to a landowner in Norfolk, England.
During the Middle Ages, the name Colby was relatively uncommon but can be found in various historical records, including the Pipe Rolls of Henry II, which document financial transactions in medieval England. One notable bearer of the name was Colby of Ingworth, a 13th-century English landowner and knight mentioned in the Testa de Nevill, a survey of feudal tenure in England.
In the 16th century, the name Colby gained popularity among Puritan families in England and later in the American colonies. One of the earliest recorded instances of the name in America was Colby Lampson, who was born in Massachusetts in 1638.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Colby. These include Colby Chew (1839-1917), an American politician and lawyer who served as a United States Representative from Pennsylvania; Colby Cosh (born 1975), a Canadian journalist and writer; Colby College in Waterville, Maine, named after Baptist minister Gardner Colby (1810-1879); and Colby Rasmus (born 1986), an American professional baseball player.
Another famous bearer of the name was Bainbridge Colby (1869-1950), an American lawyer and politician who served as the United States Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson from 1920 to 1921.
People
Colby + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Colby as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with C
Other first names starting with C with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Colby: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Colby?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 55,946 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Colby 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 6,127 US residents.
Is Colby a common name?
We classify Colby as "Uncommon". It ranks above 99.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 57,635 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Colby most popular?
The single biggest year for Colby was 2001, when 3,979 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Colby is about 27 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Colby in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 49,557 people with the name Colby, or 16.41 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #908 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 Colby 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 Colby?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Colby leans strongly male. 45,954 people counted with this name were male (92.7%), compared with 3,599 female bearers (7.3%). 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 Colby?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Colby is White at 85.0%. The next largest groups are Black (4.9%) and Two or More Races (4.3%). 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 Colby most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Colby in the 2020 Census, accounting for 85.0% (42,130 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 Colby in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Colby a male name?
Yes, 92.8% of people registered as Colby 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 Colby still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Colby 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 Colby 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 Colby?
Want to know how many Americans are named Colby? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.