Jafeth
A biblical masculine name of Hebrew origin meaning "he enlarges" or "enlargement".
Name Census estimates that about 243 living Americans carry the first name Jafeth. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Jafeth today is around 13 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Jafeth births was 2022 (23 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Jafeth. 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
243
~ 1 in 1,410,512 Americans
Peak year
2022
23 babies that year
Average age
13
years old
2024 SSA rank
#6,975
Tracked since 1999
Census
Jafeth in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 289 people with the first name Jafeth, which placed it at #30,250 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
#30,250
National first-name rank
People counted
289
289 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
94.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Jafeth
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jafeth is Hispanic at 94.1%. The next largest groups are White (3.1%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (1.7%). 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 Jafeth 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 Jafeth at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino94.1% · 272
- White3.1% · 9
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.7% · 5
- Black or African American0.7% · 2
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 1
Popularity
Jafeth: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Jafeth from the 1990s through to the 2020s, spanning 4 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 105 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Jafeth remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Jafeth 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 Jafeth during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Jafeths live
Origin
Meaning and history of Jafeth
The name Jafeth is believed to have originated from the Hebrew name Yefet, which is derived from the biblical figure Japheth, one of the three sons of Noah mentioned in the Book of Genesis. The name is thought to mean "enlargement" or "expansion" in Hebrew.
Japheth is portrayed as one of the progenitors of the nations in the biblical account. According to the Genesis narrative, after the Great Flood, the world was repopulated by the descendants of Japheth, Shem, and Ham, the three sons of Noah. Japheth's descendants were said to have migrated and settled in various regions, giving rise to different peoples and cultures.
The name Jafeth can be traced back to ancient times, appearing in various forms and spellings across different languages and cultures. In addition to its Hebrew roots, variations of the name can be found in languages such as Arabic, where it is rendered as Yafith, and Greek, where it is transliterated as Iapetos.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Jafeth is found in the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, dating back to the 3rd century BCE. In this text, the name appears as Iapethos, reflecting the Greek transliteration of the Hebrew name.
Throughout history, there have been several notable individuals who bore the name Jafeth or one of its variants. For example, Iapetus was a figure in Greek mythology, often depicted as a Titan and the personification of a craftsman. Another notable bearer of the name was Japheth ben Ali, a medieval Jewish philosopher and astronomer who lived in the 10th century CE.
Other famous individuals with the name Jafeth include Japheth Chilembwe, a Baptist teacher and revolutionary leader in Malawi who led an uprising against British colonial rule in 1915. Japheth Ngwenya was a South African lawyer and activist who played a significant role in the anti-apartheid struggle, serving as the President of the Pan Africanist Congress from 1959 to 1962.
In more recent times, Jafeth Cabrera is a Colombian professional baseball player who has played in Major League Baseball since 2012. Jafeth Soto is a Mexican-American actor and model, known for his roles in television series such as "Cane" and "Eastbound & Down."
People
Jafeth + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Jafeth as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with J
Other first names starting with J with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Jafeth: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Jafeth?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 243 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Jafeth 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 1,410,512 US residents.
Is Jafeth a common name?
We classify Jafeth as "Very Rare". It ranks above 76.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 245 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Jafeth most popular?
The single biggest year for Jafeth was 2022, when 23 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Jafeth is about 13 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Jafeth in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 289 people with the name Jafeth, or 0.10 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #30,250 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 Jafeth 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 Jafeth?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jafeth leans strongly male. 290 people counted with this name were male (98.0%), compared with 6 female bearers (2.0%). 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 Jafeth?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jafeth is Hispanic at 94.1%. The next largest groups are White (3.1%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (1.7%). 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 Jafeth most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Jafeth in the 2020 Census, accounting for 94.1% (272 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 Jafeth in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Jafeth a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Jafeth 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 Jafeth still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Jafeth 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 Jafeth 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 called Jafeth?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.