Gianni
Italian diminutive form of Giovanni, meaning "God is gracious".
Name Census estimates that about 17,955 living Americans carry the first name Gianni. It sits at #483 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 82.0% of registrations being male. The average person named Gianni today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Gianni births was 2020 (1,139 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Gianni. 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 Gianni with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Gianni is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 15 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
18K
~ 1 in 19,090 Americans
Peak year
2020
1,139 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#483
Tracked since 1962
Census
Gianni in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 11,406 people with the first name Gianni, which placed it at #2,272 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
#2,272
National first-name rank
People counted
11K
11,406 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
3.8
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
41.4% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Gianni
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Gianni is Hispanic at 41.4%. The next largest groups are White (35.5%) and Black (15.2%). 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 Gianni 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 Gianni at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino41.4% · 4,725
- White35.5% · 4,049
- Black or African American15.2% · 1,739
- Two or more races6.1% · 693
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.5% · 167
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 33
Gender
Gender distribution for Gianni
Gianni leans heavily male at 82.0% of total registrations, but 3,264 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Gianni as a male name
- Ranked #483 in 2024
- 638 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2020 (897 births)
Gianni as a female name
- Ranked #1,222 in 2024
- 192 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2021 (253 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Gianni leans strongly male. 9,654 people counted with this name were male (84.6%), compared with 1,752 female bearers (15.4%).
Popularity
Gianni: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Gianni from the 1960s through to the 2020s, spanning 7 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 6,357 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Gianni remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Gianni 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 Gianni during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Giannis live
The SSA's state-level files cover 41 states and territories. California, New York, Florida recorded the most babies named Gianni, while Hawaii, District of Columbia, Arkansas recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 371 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Gianni
The name Gianni is derived from the Italian form of the name John, which traces its origins back to the Hebrew name Yohanan, meaning "Graced by God" or "Yahweh is gracious." The name John gained immense popularity due to its association with John the Baptist and John the Apostle, two pivotal figures in the New Testament of the Bible.
The Italian variant, Gianni, emerged during the Middle Ages and became widely used throughout the Italian peninsula. It was a common name among the nobility and the general population alike. The earliest recorded instances of the name Gianni can be found in various medieval documents and records from Italian city-states and principalities.
One of the earliest and most notable bearers of the name Gianni was Gianni da Procida, an Italian physician and diplomat who lived in the 13th century. He played a crucial role in orchestrating the Sicilian Vespers, a rebellion against the Angevin rule in Sicily, which ultimately led to the establishment of the Kingdom of Sicily under the House of Barcelona.
Another prominent figure with the name Gianni was Gianni Schicchi, an Italian nobleman who lived in Florence during the late 13th and early 14th centuries. His clever scheme to alter a will in order to secure an inheritance for his family was immortalized by Dante Alighieri in the Divine Comedy, where he appears as a character in the Inferno.
During the Renaissance, the name Gianni was associated with several renowned artists and intellectuals. One such figure was Gianni Bellini, a prominent Venetian painter who lived from 1430 to 1516. His works, including religious altarpieces and portraits, were highly influential and contributed significantly to the development of Venetian Renaissance art.
In the realm of literature, Gianni Boccaccio, born in 1313, was a renowned Italian writer and poet. He is best known for his masterpiece, the Decameron, a collection of novellas that provided a captivating portrayal of 14th-century Italian society and culture.
Another notable bearer of the name Gianni was Gianni Agnelli, an Italian industrialist and principal shareholder of Fiat, who lived from 1920 to 2003. He was widely regarded as one of the most influential and stylish figures in the Italian business world, renowned for his elegance and leadership in the automotive industry.
These are just a few examples of the many notable individuals throughout history who bore the name Gianni, a name with deep roots in Italian culture and a rich tapestry of historical significance.
People
Gianni + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Gianni 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
Gianni: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Gianni?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 17,955 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Gianni 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 19,090 US residents.
Is Gianni a common name?
We classify Gianni 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, 18,174 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Gianni most popular?
The single biggest year for Gianni was 2020, when 1,139 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Gianni is about 15 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Gianni in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 11,406 people with the name Gianni, or 3.78 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #2,272 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 Gianni 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 Gianni?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Gianni leans strongly male. 9,654 people counted with this name were male (84.6%), compared with 1,752 female bearers (15.4%). 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 Gianni?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Gianni is Hispanic at 41.4%. The next largest groups are White (35.5%) and Black (15.2%). 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 Gianni most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Gianni in the 2020 Census, accounting for 41.4% (4,725 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 Gianni in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Gianni a male name?
Yes, 82.0% of people registered as Gianni 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 Gianni still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Gianni 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 Gianni 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 Gianni?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.