Ivan
A masculine name of Slavic origin meaning "God is gracious".
Name Census estimates that about 123,087 living Americans carry the first name Ivan. It sits at #153 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Ivan today is around 28 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ivan births was 2004 (3,478 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ivan. 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 Ivan with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Ivan is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 649 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
123K
~ 1 in 2,785 Americans
Peak year
2004
3,478 babies that year
Average age
28
years old
2024 SSA rank
#153
Tracked since 1880
Census
Ivan in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 137,222 people with the first name Ivan, which placed it at #413 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
#413
National first-name rank
People counted
137K
137,222 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
45.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
63.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ivan
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ivan is Hispanic at 63.2%. The next largest groups are White (25.2%) and Black (5.6%). 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 Ivan 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 Ivan at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino63.2% · 86,693
- White25.2% · 34,633
- Black or African American5.6% · 7,686
- Asian and Pacific Islander4.1% · 5,689
- Two or more races1.3% · 1,778
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.5% · 743
Gender
Gender distribution for Ivan
Out of the 148,518 babies given the name Ivan since 1880, 99.6% 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.
Ivan as a male name
- Ranked #153 in 2024
- 2,340 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2004 (3,462 births)
Ivan as a female name
- Ranked #14,115 in 2020
- 6 female births in 2020
- Peak: 1990 (20 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ivan appears almost entirely male. Of the 137,218 people counted with this name, 99.6% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Ivan: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ivan from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 30,806 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2000s peak, Ivan remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ivan 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 Ivan during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ivans live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Ivan, while Vermont, Wyoming, New Hampshire recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 2,799 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Ivan
The name Ivan is a masculine given name derived from the ancient Greek name Ioannes, which comes from the Hebrew name Yochanan. This name ultimately derives from the biblical Hebrew word "Yhvh," meaning "Yahweh is gracious." The name Ivan is a Slavic variant of the Greek name, widely used in various Slavic languages.
The earliest recorded use of the name Ivan can be traced back to the Byzantine Empire, where it was a common name among Eastern Orthodox Christians. It became particularly popular in the Slavic regions of the empire, including parts of modern-day Russia, Ukraine, and the Balkans.
In the 10th century, the name Ivan was introduced to the lands of Kievan Rus' with the Christianization of the region. It quickly gained popularity and became one of the most common names among the ruling elite and the nobility. One notable historical figure with the name Ivan was Ivan I, also known as Ivan Kalita, who was the Grand Prince of Moscow from 1325 to 1340.
During the reign of the Muscovite Tsars, the name Ivan became closely associated with Russian imperial power. Perhaps the most famous bearer of the name was Ivan IV, also known as Ivan the Terrible (1530-1584), who was the first ruler to be crowned as Tsar of All the Russias. His reign was marked by significant territorial expansion and the centralization of power, as well as brutal oppression and violence.
Another notable Ivan in Russian history was Ivan III, also known as Ivan the Great (1440-1505), who played a crucial role in ending the Mongol-Tatar rule over Russia and laid the foundations for the Russian nation-state.
In the 19th century, the name Ivan became a symbol of the common Russian people, particularly in the works of prominent Russian writers such as Fyodor Dostoevsky and Leo Tolstoy. One famous literary character with the name is Ivan Karamazov from Dostoevsky's novel "The Brothers Karamazov."
Outside of Russia, the name Ivan has been used in various Slavic cultures, including Serbia, where it is rendered as Jovan, and Bulgaria, where it is spelled as Ivan. One notable bearer of the name from Serbia was Jovan Cvijić (1865-1927), a renowned geographer and founder of anthropogeography.
Throughout history, the name Ivan has been borne by numerous individuals across various fields, including writers, artists, scientists, and political figures, reflecting its enduring popularity and cultural significance in Slavic cultures and beyond.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Ivan
People
Ivan + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ivan 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
Ivan: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ivan?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 123,087 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ivan 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 2,785 US residents.
Is Ivan a common name?
We classify Ivan as "Common". It ranks above 99.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 148,518 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ivan most popular?
The single biggest year for Ivan was 2004, when 3,478 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ivan is about 28 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ivan in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 137,222 people with the name Ivan, or 45.43 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #413 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 Ivan 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 Ivan?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ivan appears almost entirely male. Of the 137,218 people counted with this name, 99.6% 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 Ivan?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ivan is Hispanic at 63.2%. The next largest groups are White (25.2%) and Black (5.6%). 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 Ivan most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Ivan in the 2020 Census, accounting for 63.2% (86,693 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 Ivan in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ivan a male name?
Yes, 99.6% of people registered as Ivan 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 Ivan still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ivan 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 Ivan 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 Americans are named Ivan?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.