Dexter
From Latin, meaning "skilled with the right hand".
Name Census estimates that about 31,193 living Americans carry the first name Dexter. It is a predominantly male name (99.4% of registrations). The average person named Dexter today is around 37 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Dexter births was 2012 (842 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Dexter. 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 Dexter with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Dexter is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 218 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
31K
~ 1 in 10,988 Americans
Peak year
2012
842 babies that year
Average age
37
years old
2024 SSA rank
#720
Tracked since 1880
Census
Dexter in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 26,700 people with the first name Dexter, which placed it at #1,344 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
#1,344
National first-name rank
People counted
27K
26,700 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
8.8
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
42.3% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Dexter
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Dexter is Black at 42.3%. The next largest groups are White (40.5%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (6.2%). 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 Dexter 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 Dexter at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American42.3% · 11,288
- White40.5% · 10,806
- Asian and Pacific Islander6.2% · 1,653
- Hispanic or Latino5.6% · 1,497
- Two or more races4.4% · 1,185
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.0% · 271
Gender
Gender distribution for Dexter
Out of the 36,404 babies given the name Dexter since 1880, 99.4% 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.
Dexter as a male name
- Ranked #720 in 2024
- 364 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2012 (842 births)
Dexter as a female name
- Ranked #12,316 in 1988
- 5 female births in 1988
- Peak: 1923 (16 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Dexter appears almost entirely male. Of the 26,692 people counted with this name, 99.6% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Dexter: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Dexter from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 7,152 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Dexter remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Dexter 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 Dexter during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Dexters live
The SSA's state-level files cover 48 states and territories. Georgia, California, Texas recorded the most babies named Dexter, while Wyoming, Alaska, Montana recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 646 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Dexter
The name Dexter is derived from the Latin word "dexter" meaning "right-handed" or "fortunate." It originated in ancient Rome, where the term was used to describe someone who was skilled with their right hand or considered lucky. The name gained popularity during the Roman Empire and was often given to boys born under auspicious circumstances.
In the early days of Christianity, the name Dexter was associated with the Latin phrase "dextra Domini," meaning "the right hand of the Lord." This connection led to the name being adopted by some Christian families as a way to express their religious beliefs. It was particularly common in regions where Latin was widely spoken, such as Italy and parts of Western Europe.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Dexter can be found in the writings of the Roman historian Tacitus, who mentions a man named Dexter who lived in the 1st century AD. Another notable figure from ancient times was Dexter, the Bishop of Syracuse, who lived in the 5th century and is venerated as a saint in the Catholic Church.
During the Middle Ages, the name Dexter remained in use but was relatively uncommon compared to other popular names of the time. However, it experienced a resurgence in the Renaissance period, particularly in Italy and other parts of Europe influenced by classical Roman culture.
One of the most famous individuals named Dexter was Dexter Wedmore (1613-1683), an English politician and member of the House of Commons during the 17th century. Another notable bearer of the name was Dexter Morgan (1862-1944), an American industrialist and philanthropist who founded the Morgan Corporation.
In the 20th century, the name Dexter gained popularity in the United States, where it was sometimes used as a shortened form of the name Dexter James. One of the most well-known individuals with this name was Dexter Gordon (1923-1990), an influential American jazz saxophonist and composer.
Other notable figures named Dexter include Dexter Holland (born 1965), the lead singer of the American punk rock band The Offspring, and Dexter Fowler (born 1986), an American professional baseball player who won a World Series championship with the Chicago Cubs in 2016.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Dexter
People
Dexter + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Dexter 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
Dexter: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Dexter?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 31,193 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Dexter 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 10,988 US residents.
Is Dexter a common name?
We classify Dexter as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 36,404 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Dexter most popular?
The single biggest year for Dexter was 2012, when 842 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Dexter is about 37 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Dexter in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 26,700 people with the name Dexter, or 8.84 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,344 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 Dexter 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 Dexter?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Dexter appears almost entirely male. Of the 26,692 people counted with this name, 99.6% 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 Dexter?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Dexter is Black at 42.3%. The next largest groups are White (40.5%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (6.2%). 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 Dexter most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Dexter in the 2020 Census, accounting for 42.3% (11,288 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 Dexter in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Dexter a male name?
Yes, 99.4% of people registered as Dexter 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 Dexter still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Dexter 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 Dexter 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 Dexter?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.