Denis
A masculine name of French origin meaning "from Dionysius".
Name Census estimates that about 15,473 living Americans carry the first name Denis. It is a predominantly male name (96.0% of registrations). The average person named Denis today is around 53 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Denis births was 1952 (625 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Denis. 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 Denis with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Denis is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 867 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
15K
~ 1 in 22,152 Americans
Peak year
1952
625 babies that year
Average age
53
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,639
Tracked since 1880
Census
Denis in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 27,745 people with the first name Denis, which placed it at #1,315 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
#1,315
National first-name rank
People counted
28K
27,745 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
9.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Denis
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Denis is White at 65.7%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (25.6%) and Black (5.2%). 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 Denis 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 Denis at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.7% · 18,218
- Hispanic or Latino25.6% · 7,100
- Black or African American5.2% · 1,451
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.1% · 572
- Two or more races1.2% · 344
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.2% · 60
Gender
Gender distribution for Denis
Denis leans heavily male at 96.0% of total registrations, but 867 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Denis as a male name
- Ranked #1,639 in 2024
- 103 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1952 (618 births)
Denis as a female name
- Ranked #11,321 in 2024
- 8 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2008 (34 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Denis leans strongly male. 26,007 people counted with this name were male (93.7%), compared with 1,738 female bearers (6.3%).
Popularity
Denis: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Denis from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1950s, with 5,010 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
Denis 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 Denis during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Denis' live
The SSA's state-level files cover 40 states and territories. New York, California, Massachusetts recorded the most babies named Denis, while Montana, Oklahoma, Tennessee recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 397 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Denis
The name Denis is derived from the ancient Greek name Dionysios, which was the name of the Greek god of wine, vegetation, pleasure, festivity, and madness. The name Dionysios is thought to have originated from the Greek words "dios" meaning divine and "nysus" meaning tree or vegetation. The name was Latinized to Dionysius during the Roman era.
Denis was a common name among early Christians, particularly in France, as it was borne by St. Denis, the patron saint of France. According to tradition, St. Denis was a Christian missionary who was martyred in the 3rd century AD and is often depicted carrying his own severed head.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Denis can be found in the 7th century AD, when a French abbot and scholar named Denis Petau or Dionysius Petavius (1583-1652) wrote extensively on theology and chronology. Another early bearer of the name was Denis the Carthusian (1402-1471), a Flemish theologian and mystic.
In the Middle Ages, the name Denis was popular in France and other parts of Europe, particularly among the nobility. One notable bearer of the name was Denis Papin (1647-1712), a French physicist, mathematician, and inventor, best known for his pioneering work on the steam digester, an early version of the pressure cooker.
During the Renaissance period, the name Denis was also used by several notable figures, including Denis Diderot (1713-1784), a French philosopher, art critic, and writer, who was a prominent figure during the Age of Enlightenment and served as the chief editor of the famous Encyclopédie.
In more recent history, the name Denis has been borne by several influential people, such as Denis Waitley (born 1933), an American motivational speaker and author, and Denis Naughten (born 1973), an Irish politician who has served as a member of the Irish parliament since 1997.
Throughout its long history, the name Denis has maintained its connection to its ancient Greek roots, symbolizing vitality, celebration, and a connection to nature and the divine.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Denis
People
Denis + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Denis as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with D
Other first names starting with D with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Denis: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Denis?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 15,473 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Denis 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 22,152 US residents.
Is Denis a common name?
We classify Denis as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 21,503 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Denis most popular?
The single biggest year for Denis was 1952, when 625 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Denis is about 53 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Denis in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 27,745 people with the name Denis, or 9.19 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,315 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 Denis 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 Denis?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Denis leans strongly male. 26,007 people counted with this name were male (93.7%), compared with 1,738 female bearers (6.3%). 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 Denis?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Denis is White at 65.7%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (25.6%) and Black (5.2%). 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 Denis most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Denis in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.7% (18,218 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 Denis in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Denis a male name?
Yes, 96.0% of people registered as Denis 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 Denis still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Denis 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 Denis 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 Denis?
Want to know how many Americans are named Denis? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.