Derick
A masculine name of English origin meaning "a people's ruler".
Name Census estimates that about 18,760 living Americans carry the first name Derick. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Derick today is around 36 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Derick births was 1989 (571 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Derick. 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 Derick with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
19K
~ 1 in 18,270 Americans
Peak year
1989
571 babies that year
Average age
36
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,434
Tracked since 1945
Census
Derick in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 16,744 people with the first name Derick, which placed it at #1,786 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
#1,786
National first-name rank
People counted
17K
16,744 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
5.5
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
43.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Derick
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Derick is White at 43.1%. The next largest groups are Black (27.6%) and Hispanic (20.0%). 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 Derick 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 Derick at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White43.1% · 7,212
- Black or African American27.6% · 4,626
- Hispanic or Latino20.0% · 3,348
- Asian and Pacific Islander4.4% · 735
- Two or more races3.8% · 641
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 182
Gender
Gender distribution for Derick
Out of the 19,690 babies given the name Derick since 1880, 99.8% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Derick as a male name
- Ranked #1,434 in 2024
- 126 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1989 (571 births)
Derick as a female name
- Ranked #10,706 in 1988
- 6 female births in 1988
- Peak: 1974 (6 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Derick appears almost entirely male. Of the 16,739 people counted with this name, 99.7% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Derick: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Derick from the 1940s through to the 2020s, spanning 9 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 4,985 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1980s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Derick 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 Derick during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Dericks live
The SSA's state-level files cover 45 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Derick, while Montana, North Dakota, District of Columbia recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 361 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Derick
The name Derick has its origins in the Germanic languages, derived from the Old English word "deor" meaning "deer" or "beloved". It is a variant spelling of the more common name Derek, which has been in use since the Middle Ages.
In its earliest forms, the name was spelled as "Deoric" or "Dioroc" and was popular among the Anglo-Saxons. It was a common name among the nobility and upper classes of medieval England and Scotland.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name is found in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which mentions a "Dioroc" who was a thegn (a nobleman) in the service of King Canute in the 11th century.
The name gained popularity in the later Middle Ages and was borne by several notable historical figures. One of the most famous was Derick of Aragon, a 13th-century Spanish nobleman and military leader who fought against the Moors during the Reconquista.
Another notable bearer of the name was Derick van Kouwenhoven, a 17th-century Dutch explorer and navigator who is credited with the discovery of several islands in the South Pacific.
In the 19th century, Derick Parnell was an Irish politician and leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party who fought for home rule for Ireland. He was born in 1846 and died in 1891.
A more recent example is Derick Brassard, a Canadian professional ice hockey player who was born in 1987 and has played for several teams in the National Hockey League.
One of the most famous bearers of the name in modern times was Derick Brooks, an American author and journalist who was born in 1937 and won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1973 for his novel "The Times They Are A-Changin'".
While the name has fallen out of widespread use in recent decades, it remains a distinctive and historically significant name with a rich heritage spanning centuries and cultures.
People
Derick + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Derick 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
Derick: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Derick?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 18,760 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Derick 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 18,270 US residents.
Is Derick a common name?
We classify Derick as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 19,690 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Derick most popular?
The single biggest year for Derick was 1989, when 571 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Derick is about 36 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Derick in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 16,744 people with the name Derick, or 5.54 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,786 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 Derick 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 Derick?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Derick appears almost entirely male. Of the 16,739 people counted with this name, 99.7% 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 Derick?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Derick is White at 43.1%. The next largest groups are Black (27.6%) and Hispanic (20.0%). 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 Derick most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Derick in the 2020 Census, accounting for 43.1% (7,212 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 Derick in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Derick a male name?
Yes, 99.8% of people registered as Derick 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 Derick still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Derick 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 Derick 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 common is the name Derick?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.