Eugene
Of Greek origin meaning "well-born" or "noble".
Name Census estimates that about 148,291 living Americans carry the first name Eugene. It is a predominantly male name (99.3% of registrations). The average person named Eugene today is around 66 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Eugene births was 1927 (9,827 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Eugene. 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 Eugene with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Eugene is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 2,632 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • The typical person named Eugene is about 66 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Eugenes were born before 1970.
- • Compared to the 1920s, recent registration numbers for Eugene have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
148K
~ 1 in 2,311 Americans
Peak year
1927
9,827 babies that year
Average age
66
years old
2024 SSA rank
#870
Tracked since 1880
Census
Eugene in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 143,351 people with the first name Eugene, which placed it at #396 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
#396
National first-name rank
People counted
143K
143,351 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
47.5
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
68.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Eugene
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Eugene is White at 68.7%. The next largest groups are Black (18.3%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (4.9%). 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 Eugene 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 Eugene at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White68.7% · 98,435
- Black or African American18.3% · 26,288
- Asian and Pacific Islander4.9% · 7,082
- Hispanic or Latino4.7% · 6,714
- Two or more races2.4% · 3,376
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.0% · 1,456
Gender
Gender distribution for Eugene
Out of the 383,085 babies given the name Eugene since 1880, 99.3% 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.
Eugene as a male name
- Ranked #870 in 2024
- 276 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1927 (9,742 births)
Eugene as a female name
- Ranked #16,293 in 2019
- 5 female births in 2019
- Peak: 1927 (85 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Eugene appears almost entirely male. Of the 143,351 people counted with this name, 99.5% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Eugene: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Eugene from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 85,390 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1920s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Eugene 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 Eugene during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Eugenes live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois recorded the most babies named Eugene, while Alaska, Nevada, Wyoming recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 7,149 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Eugene
The name Eugene has its origins in the Greek language, derived from the Greek word "eugenes," meaning "well-born" or "noble." The earliest recorded use of the name dates back to the 4th century AD, when it was used for several early Christian saints and martyrs.
One of the most notable historical figures with the name Eugene was Eugene of Savoy (1663-1736), a renowned military commander and statesman who served as the Governor of the Habsburg Netherlands and the Imperial Commander-in-Chief of the Holy Roman Empire's armies. He played a pivotal role in the War of the Spanish Succession and is celebrated for his military victories against the Ottoman Empire.
Another prominent figure was Eugene Viollet-le-Duc (1814-1879), a French architect and author who was a leading figure in the Gothic Revival movement. He is famous for his restoration work on several historic buildings, including Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris.
In literature, the name Eugene appears in several notable works, such as Eugene Onegin, a novel in verse by Alexander Pushkin (1799-1837), which follows the life and experiences of a wealthy and jaded young man in 19th-century Russian society.
The name Eugene also has a strong connection to the Catholic Church, with several saints bearing the name, including St. Eugene of Carthage (5th century), a martyr during the Vandal persecution of Christians in North Africa, and St. Eugene de Mazenod (1782-1861), the founder of the Oblates of Mary Immaculate religious congregation.
Other notable figures with the name Eugene include Eugene Atget (1857-1927), a French photographer renowned for his documentation of the streets and architecture of Paris, and Eugene O'Neill (1888-1953), an American playwright and Nobel laureate who is considered one of the greatest dramatists of the 20th century.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Eugene
People
Eugene + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Eugene 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
Eugene: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Eugene?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 148,291 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Eugene 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 2,311 US residents.
Is Eugene a common name?
We classify Eugene as "Common". It ranks above 99.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 383,085 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Eugene most popular?
The single biggest year for Eugene was 1927, when 9,827 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Eugene is about 66 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Eugene in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 143,351 people with the name Eugene, or 47.46 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #396 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 Eugene 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 Eugene?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Eugene appears almost entirely male. Of the 143,351 people counted with this name, 99.5% 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 Eugene?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Eugene is White at 68.7%. The next largest groups are Black (18.3%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (4.9%). 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 Eugene most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Eugene in the 2020 Census, accounting for 68.7% (98,435 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 Eugene in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Eugene a male name?
Yes, 99.3% of people registered as Eugene 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 Eugene still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Eugene 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 Eugene 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 are named Eugene?
Want to know how many Americans are named Eugene? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.