Gari
A name of African origin meaning "courage."
Name Census estimates that about 497 living Americans carry the first name Gari. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 75.4% of registrations being female. The average person named Gari today is around 60 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Gari births was 1963 (31 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Gari. 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 Gari with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
497
~ 1 in 689,647 Americans
Peak year
1963
31 babies that year
Average age
60
years old
1993 SSA rank
#9,212
Tracked since 1938
Census
Gari in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 742 people with the first name Gari, which placed it at #15,477 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
#15,477
National first-name rank
People counted
742
742 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
66.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Gari
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Gari is White at 66.8%. The next largest groups are Black (12.8%) and Hispanic (12.3%). 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 Gari 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 Gari at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White66.8% · 496
- Black or African American12.8% · 95
- Hispanic or Latino12.3% · 91
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.8% · 28
- Two or more races3.6% · 27
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.7% · 5
Gender
Gender distribution for Gari
Gari is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 643 total registrations, 158 (24.6%) were male and 485 (75.4%) were female.
Gari as a male name
- Ranked #9,212 in 1993
- 5 male births in 1993
- Peak: 1963 (13 births)
Gari as a female name
- Ranked #18,561 in 2007
- 5 female births in 2007
- Peak: 1967 (24 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Gari on both sides of the split. Of the 731 people counted with this name, 300 were male (41.0%) and 431 were female (59.0%).
Popularity
Gari: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Gari from the 1930s through to the 2000s, spanning 8 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1960s, with 203 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1960s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Gari 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 Gari during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Garis live
Origin
Meaning and history of Gari
The name Gari is a diminutive form of the name Garialdo, which is derived from the Germanic elements "gairu" meaning "spear" and "waldan" meaning "to rule or govern". The name has its origins in medieval Germanic cultures, particularly among the Franks and Lombards in the 6th to 8th centuries AD.
Gari was a relatively common name among the Frankish nobility during the Merovingian and Carolingian dynasties. One of the earliest recorded instances of the name can be found in the "Annales Regni Francorum" (Annals of the Frankish Kingdom), where a Frankish nobleman named Gari is mentioned as a participant in the Battle of Poitiers in 732 AD.
In the 9th century, a Frankish monk named Gari of St. Gall (c. 810 - 870) gained prominence as a scholar, poet, and teacher at the Abbey of St. Gall in modern-day Switzerland. He is known for his works on grammar, poetry, and hagiography.
Another notable figure with the name Gari was Gari of Anjou (c. 995 - 1040), a French nobleman who served as the Count of Anjou from 1036 to 1040. He played a significant role in the conflicts between the House of Anjou and the House of Blois during the early 11th century.
In the 12th century, Gari of Fontaines (c. 1150 - 1225) was a French theologian and philosopher who taught at the University of Paris. He is known for his works on logic and metaphysics, and his contributions to the development of scholastic philosophy.
During the Renaissance period, Gari Ferri (c. 1490 - 1548) was an Italian painter and architect from the city of Faenza. He is remembered for his fresco works in various churches and palaces in Emilia-Romagna, Italy.
People
Gari + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Gari as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with G
Other first names starting with G with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Gari: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Gari?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 497 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Gari 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 689,647 US residents.
Is Gari a common name?
We classify Gari as "Very Rare". It ranks above 84.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 643 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Gari most popular?
The single biggest year for Gari was 1963, when 31 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Gari is about 60 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Gari in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 742 people with the name Gari, or 0.25 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #15,477 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 Gari 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 Gari?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Gari on both sides of the split. Of the 731 people counted with this name, 300 were male (41.0%) and 431 were female (59.0%). 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 Gari?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Gari is White at 66.8%. The next largest groups are Black (12.8%) and Hispanic (12.3%). 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 Gari most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Gari in the 2020 Census, accounting for 66.8% (496 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 Gari in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Gari a female name?
Yes, 75.4% of people registered as Gari 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 Gari still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Gari 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 Gari 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 have the name Gari?
If you just want to know how many people share the name Gari, HowManyOfMe.org gives you the headline number in one glance.