Harold
A masculine name of Old English origin meaning "commander of the army".
Name Census estimates that about 183,886 living Americans carry the first name Harold. It is a predominantly male name (99.5% of registrations). The average person named Harold today is around 69 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Harold births was 1924 (14,230 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Harold. 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 Harold with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Harold is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 2,648 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • The typical person named Harold is about 69 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Harolds were born before 1967.
- • Compared to the 1920s, recent registration numbers for Harold have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
184K
~ 1 in 1,864 Americans
Peak year
1924
14,230 babies that year
Average age
69
years old
2024 SSA rank
#988
Tracked since 1880
Census
Harold in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 186,444 people with the first name Harold, which placed it at #298 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
#298
National first-name rank
People counted
186K
186,444 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
61.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
76.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Harold
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Harold is White at 76.9%. The next largest groups are Black (14.4%) and Hispanic (4.2%). 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 Harold 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 Harold at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White76.9% · 143,338
- Black or African American14.4% · 26,917
- Hispanic or Latino4.2% · 7,837
- Two or more races2.2% · 4,183
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.3% · 2,343
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.0% · 1,826
Gender
Gender distribution for Harold
Out of the 554,046 babies given the name Harold since 1880, 99.5% 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.
Harold as a male name
- Ranked #988 in 2024
- 227 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1924 (14,149 births)
Harold as a female name
- Ranked #14,813 in 2004
- 6 female births in 2004
- Peak: 1927 (99 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Harold appears almost entirely male. Of the 186,450 people counted with this name, 99.9% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Harold: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Harold 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 134,392 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
Harold 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 Harold during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Harolds live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois recorded the most babies named Harold, while Nevada, Alaska, Delaware recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 10,347 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Harold
The name Harold is of Germanic origin, derived from the Old Norse name Haraldr. It is composed of the elements "har" meaning "army" and "valdr" meaning "ruler" or "leader." The name can be traced back to the 9th century and was particularly popular among the Vikings and other Scandinavian peoples.
Harold was a common name among the ruling classes in medieval England, after the Norman Conquest in 1066. The most famous bearer of this name was Harold Godwinson, the last Anglo-Saxon king of England, who was defeated by William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. This historical event marked a significant turning point in English history and contributed to the popularity of the name.
In the 11th century, the name Harold appeared in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, an important historical record that documented events in England from the 9th to the 12th centuries. The name was also mentioned in various medieval literary works, such as the Old English poem "Beowulf" and the Icelandic sagas.
One of the earliest recorded bearers of the name Harold was Harold Fairhair, the first king of Norway, who ruled from around 872 to 930 AD. Another notable figure was Harold Bluetooth, the king of Denmark and Norway, who lived from around 935 to 986 AD and was responsible for uniting the two kingdoms.
Throughout history, several other prominent individuals have borne the name Harold. These include Harold Hardrada (c. 1015-1066), the King of Norway who was defeated by Harold Godwinson at the Battle of Stamford Bridge in 1066. Another notable bearer was Harold I (c. 1016-1040), the King of England from 1037 to 1040.
In the modern era, some famous individuals with the name Harold include Harold Pinter (1930-2008), the British playwright and Nobel Prize winner in Literature, and Harold Wilson (1916-1995), the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1964 to 1970 and 1974 to 1976.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Harold
People
Harold + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Harold as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with H
Other first names starting with H with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Harold: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Harold?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 183,886 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Harold 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 1,864 US residents.
Is Harold a common name?
We classify Harold 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, 554,046 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Harold most popular?
The single biggest year for Harold was 1924, when 14,230 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Harold is about 69 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Harold in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 186,444 people with the name Harold, or 61.73 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #298 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 Harold 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 Harold?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Harold appears almost entirely male. Of the 186,450 people counted with this name, 99.9% 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 Harold?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Harold is White at 76.9%. The next largest groups are Black (14.4%) and Hispanic (4.2%). 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 Harold most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Harold in the 2020 Census, accounting for 76.9% (143,338 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 Harold in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Harold a male name?
Yes, 99.5% of people registered as Harold 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 Harold still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Harold 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 Harold 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 Harold?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.