Kanin
A Scandinavian name derived from a word meaning "straw" or "basket".
Name Census estimates that about 386 living Americans carry the first name Kanin. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Kanin today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Kanin births was 2008 (37 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Kanin. 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
386
~ 1 in 887,965 Americans
Peak year
2008
37 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#7,471
Tracked since 1986
Census
Kanin in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 380 people with the first name Kanin, which placed it at #25,078 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
#25,078
National first-name rank
People counted
380
380 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
63.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Kanin
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Kanin is White at 63.7%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (10.3%) and Two or More Races (8.4%). 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 Kanin 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 Kanin at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White63.7% · 242
- Asian and Pacific Islander10.3% · 39
- Two or more races8.4% · 32
- Hispanic or Latino7.4% · 28
- Black or African American6.6% · 25
- American Indian and Alaska Native3.7% · 14
Popularity
Kanin: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Kanin from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 160 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Kanin remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Kanin 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 Kanin during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Kanins live
Origin
Meaning and history of Kanin
The name Kanin traces its origins to the Old Norse language, spoken by the Germanic tribes that inhabited Scandinavia during the 8th to 13th centuries. The name is believed to be derived from the Old Norse word "kannr," which means "chalice" or "cup." This association suggests that the name may have been originally given to individuals who worked as cup-bearers or had some connection to the production or serving of drinks.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Kanin can be found in the Icelandic Sagas, a collection of literary works from the 13th and 14th centuries that recount the lives and adventures of the Norse settlers in Iceland. In the Saga of Grettir the Strong, written in the early 13th century, a character named Kanin is mentioned as a farmer and landowner in the Skagafjörður region of northern Iceland.
The name Kanin gained wider recognition in the 16th and 17th centuries, during the Protestant Reformation in Europe. Kanin Gottfredsson (1530-1597) was a Danish theologian and reformer who played a significant role in establishing Lutheranism in Denmark. He is known for translating the Bible into Danish and for his efforts in promoting education and literacy among the common people.
In the 18th century, Kanin Eriksson (1701-1768) was a Swedish botanist and explorer who accompanied the renowned naturalist Carl Linnaeus on several expeditions to Lapland. Eriksson made valuable contributions to the study of the flora and fauna of northern Scandinavia, and his field notes and illustrations were used by Linnaeus in his groundbreaking works on plant classification.
Moving into the 19th century, Kanin Thomsen (1819-1876) was a Norwegian painter and printmaker who is celebrated for his depictions of Norwegian landscapes and rural life. His works, characterized by their realistic and detailed rendering of nature, played a significant role in the development of the Norwegian romantic nationalist movement in art.
Another notable figure with the name Kanin is Kanin Björnsson (1871-1949), an Icelandic politician and diplomat who served as the first Minister of Foreign Affairs for Iceland after the country gained independence from Denmark in 1918. Björnsson played a crucial role in establishing Iceland's diplomatic relations with other nations and in securing its recognition as a sovereign state.
These are just a few examples of the individuals who have carried the name Kanin throughout history, each contributing to their respective fields and leaving a lasting impact on their communities and societies.
People
Kanin + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Kanin as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with K
Other first names starting with K with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Kanin: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Kanin?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 386 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Kanin 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 887,965 US residents.
Is Kanin a common name?
We classify Kanin as "Very Rare". It ranks above 82% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 390 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Kanin most popular?
The single biggest year for Kanin was 2008, when 37 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Kanin is about 15 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Kanin in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 380 people with the name Kanin, or 0.13 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #25,078 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 Kanin 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 Kanin?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Kanin leans strongly male. 354 people counted with this name were male (93.9%), compared with 23 female bearers (6.1%). 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 Kanin?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Kanin is White at 63.7%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (10.3%) and Two or More Races (8.4%). 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 Kanin most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Kanin in the 2020 Census, accounting for 63.7% (242 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 Kanin in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Kanin a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Kanin 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 Kanin still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Kanin 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 Kanin 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 common is the name Kanin?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many people share the name Kanin at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.