Imanuel
A masculine name of Hebrew origin meaning "God is with us".
Name Census estimates that about 338 living Americans carry the first name Imanuel. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Imanuel today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Imanuel births was 2004 (19 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Imanuel. 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.
People living today
338
~ 1 in 1,014,066 Americans
Peak year
2004
19 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2024 SSA rank
#11,417
Tracked since 1984
Popularity
Imanuel: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Imanuel from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 135 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2000s peak, Imanuel remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Imanuel 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 Imanuel during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Imanuel
The name Imanuel has its origins in Hebrew and is a variation of the name Emmanuel, which means "God is with us." The name can be traced back to the Old Testament of the Bible, where it is mentioned in the Book of Isaiah as a prophecy foretelling the birth of the Messiah.
In the New Testament, the name Emmanuel is given to Jesus Christ, as stated in the Gospel of Matthew. The Greek spelling of the name, Emmanouel, was later transliterated into Latin as Immanuel, which eventually led to the spelling variation Imanuel.
One of the earliest recorded individuals with the name Imanuel was Imanuel ben Solomon, a 14th-century Italian Hebrew poet and scholar. He was born in Rome around 1270 and is known for his works in Hebrew poetry and biblical exegesis.
In the 16th century, Imanuel Tremellius, an Italian Renaissance scholar and Hebraist, gained prominence for his translations of the Bible from Hebrew into Latin. He was born in Ferrara, Italy, in 1510 and died in 1580.
Another notable figure with the name Imanuel was Imanuel Velikovsky, a Russian-born pseudoscientist and author who proposed controversial theories about ancient history and the cosmos. He was born in 1895 in Vitebsk, Russian Empire (now Belarus), and died in 1979 in the United States.
In the 20th century, Imanuel Kant, a German philosopher and one of the most influential thinkers of the Enlightenment, was a prominent bearer of the name. He was born in Königsberg, Prussia (now Kaliningrad, Russia) in 1724 and died in 1804.
Imanuel Geiss, a German historian and political scientist, was also a notable figure. He was born in 1931 in Berlin and made significant contributions to the study of international relations and the history of diplomacy.
These are just a few examples of individuals throughout history who have carried the name Imanuel, a name with deep roots in religious and cultural traditions, and one that has been borne by scholars, philosophers, and other influential figures across various fields and time periods.
People
Imanuel + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Imanuel as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with I
Other first names starting with I with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Imanuel: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Imanuel?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 338 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Imanuel 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 1,014,066 US residents.
Is Imanuel a common name?
We classify Imanuel as "Very Rare". It ranks above 80.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 342 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Imanuel most popular?
The single biggest year for Imanuel was 2004, when 19 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Imanuel is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Imanuel a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Imanuel 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.
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.