Emiley
A feminine name of Germanic origin meaning "industrious" or "hardworking".
Name Census estimates that about 1,704 living Americans carry the first name Emiley. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Emiley today is around 26 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Emiley births was 2005 (80 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Emiley. 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 Emiley with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
1.7K
~ 1 in 201,147 Americans
Peak year
2005
80 babies that year
Average age
26
years old
2023 SSA rank
#15,888
Tracked since 1917
Census
Emiley in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,561 people with the first name Emiley, which placed it at #9,070 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
#9,070
National first-name rank
People counted
1.6K
1,561 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.5
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
74.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Emiley
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Emiley is White at 74.0%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (14.8%) 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 Emiley 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 Emiley at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White74.0% · 1,155
- Hispanic or Latino14.8% · 231
- Two or more races3.7% · 58
- Black or African American3.1% · 49
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.1% · 48
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.3% · 20
Popularity
Emiley: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Emiley from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 11 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 664 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
Emiley 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 Emiley during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Emileys live
The SSA's state-level files cover 11 states and territories. California, Texas, Florida recorded the most babies named Emiley, while Washington, New York, Alabama recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 32 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Emiley
The name Emiley is a variant spelling of the English feminine name Emily, which is derived from the French Amelie or Emelie. The origins of the name can be traced back to the Germanic Amal, meaning "work" or "labor."
The name Emily first appeared in England after the Norman Conquest of 1066, when it was introduced by the French and became a popular name among the aristocracy. It is believed that the first recorded use of the name was in the 12th century, when it was mentioned in the Domesday Book, a survey of landowners in England commissioned by William the Conqueror.
One of the earliest notable figures to bear the name was Emily de Fortibus, Countess of Devon, who lived in the 13th century. Another early Emily of note was Emily de Longchamp, a French noblewoman who was a companion of Eleanor of Aquitaine in the 12th century.
During the Middle Ages, the name Emily was often associated with religious devotion and piety. It was popularized by several saints, including St. Emily de Vichy, a 13th-century French nun, and St. Emily Bicchieri, a 14th-century Italian nun and mystic.
In literature, one of the earliest and most famous uses of the name was in the 18th-century novel "The Mysteries of Udolpho" by Ann Radcliffe, where the protagonist was named Emily St. Aubert.
Other notable historical figures named Emily include Emily Dickinson (1830-1886), the renowned American poet; Emily Bronte (1818-1848), the English novelist and author of "Wuthering Heights"; Emily Pankhurst (1858-1928), the British political activist and leader of the British suffragette movement; Emily Murphy (1868-1933), a Canadian women's rights activist and the first female magistrate in the British Empire; and Emily Carr (1871-1945), the Canadian artist and writer.
Throughout history, the name Emiley has maintained a connection to strength, resilience, and creativity, making it a popular choice for parents seeking a name with a rich heritage and inspiring connotations.
People
Emiley + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Emiley as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with E
Other first names starting with E with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Emiley: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Emiley?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 1,704 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Emiley 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 201,147 US residents.
Is Emiley a common name?
We classify Emiley as "Rare". It ranks above 93% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 1,779 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Emiley most popular?
The single biggest year for Emiley was 2005, when 80 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Emiley is about 26 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Emiley in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,561 people with the name Emiley, or 0.52 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #9,070 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 Emiley 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 Emiley?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Emiley appears almost entirely female. Of the 1,559 people counted with this name, 99.9% were female and only a very small share were male. 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 Emiley?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Emiley is White at 74.0%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (14.8%) 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 Emiley most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Emiley in the 2020 Census, accounting for 74.0% (1,155 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 Emiley in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Emiley a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Emiley in the SSA data are female. 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 Emiley still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Emiley 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 Emiley 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 Emiley?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many people have the name Emiley at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.