Jorge
A masculine Spanish name derived from the Greek name George, meaning "farmer".
Name Census estimates that about 132,527 living Americans carry the first name Jorge. It sits at #285 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. It is a predominantly male name (99.5% of registrations). The average person named Jorge today is around 31 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Jorge births was 2006 (3,518 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Jorge. 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 Jorge with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Jorge is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 690 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
133K
~ 1 in 2,586 Americans
Peak year
2006
3,518 babies that year
Average age
31
years old
2024 SSA rank
#285
Tracked since 1910
Census
Jorge in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 282,866 people with the first name Jorge, which placed it at #186 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
#186
National first-name rank
People counted
283K
282,866 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
93.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
96.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Jorge
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jorge is Hispanic at 96.6%. The next largest groups are White (2.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (0.5%). 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 Jorge 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 Jorge at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino96.6% · 273,213
- White2.4% · 6,824
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.5% · 1,327
- Black or African American0.4% · 1,039
- Two or more races0.1% · 254
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.1% · 209
Gender
Gender distribution for Jorge
Out of the 139,076 babies given the name Jorge 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.
Jorge as a male name
- Ranked #285 in 2024
- 1,179 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2006 (3,518 births)
Jorge as a female name
- Ranked #15,838 in 2012
- 6 female births in 2012
- Peak: 1994 (31 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jorge appears almost entirely male. Of the 282,866 people counted with this name, 99.8% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Jorge: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Jorge from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 12 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 33,093 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Jorge 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 Jorge during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Jorges live
The SSA's state-level files cover 44 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Jorge, while New Hampshire, Wyoming, Hawaii recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 3,096 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Jorge
The name Jorge originates from the Greek name Georgios, derived from the Greek words ge (earth) and ergon (work), meaning "earth-worker" or "farmer". Its origins can be traced back to the ancient Greek era, around the 4th century BC. The name later spread across Europe and became popular in various forms, including Jorge in Spanish and Portuguese-speaking regions.
In the early days of Christianity, the name gained religious significance, as it was borne by several Christian saints and martyrs, including Saint George, a Roman soldier and Christian martyr who became one of the most venerated military saints. The legend of Saint George slaying a dragon became a popular story, further contributing to the name's popularity.
The name Jorge first appeared in written records during the Middle Ages, with notable figures such as Jorge Manrique, a Spanish poet born in 1440 who is renowned for his elegiac poem "Coplas por la muerte de su padre". Another early bearer of the name was Jorge de Montemayor, a Portuguese novelist and poet from the 16th century, best known for his pastoral romance "La Diana".
During the Renaissance period, Jorge Luis Vives, a Spanish scholar and humanist born in 1492, gained recognition for his works on philosophy, education, and social reforms. In the realm of exploration, Jorge de Meneses, a Portuguese navigator from the 15th century, played a crucial role in the Age of Discovery, leading expeditions to the east coast of Africa.
In more recent history, Jorge Luis Borges, an Argentine writer born in 1899 and widely regarded as one of the most influential literary figures of the 20th century, brought significant acclaim to the name. His works, including short stories and essays, explored themes of philosophy, metaphysics, and the complexities of human existence.
Other notable individuals named Jorge include Jorge Amado, a Brazilian novelist born in 1912, whose works focused on the lives and struggles of the working class in his home country; Jorge Semprún, a Spanish writer, political activist, and former Minister of Culture, born in 1923, who survived the Nazi concentration camps and later became a prominent voice against totalitarianism; and Jorge Mario Bergoglio, the current Pope Francis, born in 1936 and the first pontiff from the Americas.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Jorge
People
Jorge + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Jorge 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
Jorge: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Jorge?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 132,527 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Jorge 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 2,586 US residents.
Is Jorge a common name?
We classify Jorge 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, 139,076 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Jorge most popular?
The single biggest year for Jorge was 2006, when 3,518 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Jorge is about 31 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Jorge in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 282,866 people with the name Jorge, or 93.66 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #186 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 Jorge 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 Jorge?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jorge appears almost entirely male. Of the 282,866 people counted with this name, 99.8% 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 Jorge?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jorge is Hispanic at 96.6%. The next largest groups are White (2.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (0.5%). 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 Jorge most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Jorge in the 2020 Census, accounting for 96.6% (273,213 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 Jorge in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Jorge a male name?
Yes, 99.5% of people registered as Jorge 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 Jorge still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Jorge 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 Jorge 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 Jorge as a first name?
For a quick modern take, check how many people share the name Jorge on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.