Karsen
Of Scandinavian origin, meaning "warrior from the marsh".
Name Census estimates that about 5,057 living Americans carry the first name Karsen. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 66.3% of registrations being male. The average person named Karsen today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Karsen births was 2010 (252 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Karsen. 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 Karsen with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Karsen was once a predominantly female name but has become increasingly popular for boys in recent decades.
- • Karsen is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 15 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
5.1K
~ 1 in 67,778 Americans
Peak year
2010
252 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,838
Tracked since 1989
Census
Karsen in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 3,823 people with the first name Karsen, which placed it at #4,753 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
#4,753
National first-name rank
People counted
3.8K
3,823 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
77.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Karsen
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Karsen is White at 77.2%. The next largest groups are Black (11.2%) and Two or More Races (5.3%). 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 Karsen 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 Karsen at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White77.2% · 2,950
- Black or African American11.2% · 428
- Two or more races5.3% · 204
- Hispanic or Latino4.3% · 166
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 43
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.8% · 32
Gender
Gender distribution for Karsen
Karsen is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 5,113 total registrations, 3,390 (66.3%) were male and 1,723 (33.7%) were female.
Karsen as a male name
- Ranked #1,838 in 2024
- 88 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2018 (206 births)
Karsen as a female name
- Ranked #4,235 in 2024
- 34 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2003 (97 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Karsen on both sides of the split. Of the 3,830 people counted with this name, 2,413 were male (63.0%) and 1,417 were female (37.0%).
Popularity
Karsen: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Karsen 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 2,345 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Karsen remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Karsen 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 Karsen during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Karsens live
The SSA's state-level files cover 34 states and territories. Texas, Ohio, Louisiana recorded the most babies named Karsen, while Wyoming, Maryland, Idaho recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 67 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Karsen
The name Karsen is believed to have originated from the Old Norse language, which was spoken by the Germanic tribes in Scandinavia during the Viking Age, around the 8th to 11th centuries. It is thought to be a variant of the name Karsten, which itself is derived from the Old Norse name Karstein.
In Old Norse, the name Karstein is composed of two elements: "kar" meaning "warrior" or "soldier," and "steinn" meaning "stone." Thus, the name Karsen may have been borne by individuals who were considered strong and resilient like a stone, or by those who were skilled warriors or soldiers.
While there are no definitive records of the name's usage in ancient texts or religious scriptures, some historians believe it may have been used by Norse warriors or settlers who ventured to other parts of Europe during the Viking Age.
One of the earliest recorded individuals with the name Karsen was a Danish nobleman named Karsen Bille, who lived in the 14th century. He was a member of the influential Bille family and served as a trusted advisor to King Valdemar IV of Denmark.
Another notable figure was Karsen Kold, a Danish theologian and educator who lived from 1793 to 1871. He was instrumental in establishing the folk high school movement in Denmark, which aimed to provide education and cultural enrichment to rural communities.
In the 19th century, a Norwegian-American businessman named Karsen Isachsen (1828-1907) made significant contributions to the development of the mining industry in the American West. He was a pioneer in the exploration and extraction of precious metals in Nevada and Colorado.
The name Karsen also gained some prominence in the arts, with a Danish actor named Karsen Pedersen (1903-1988) who appeared in several films during the golden age of Danish cinema in the 1930s and 1940s.
More recently, a Norwegian footballer named Karsen Kusk Pedersen (born 1988) has represented his country at the international level and played for various clubs in Europe, including the Danish team Brøndby IF.
While the name Karsen is not as common today as it once was, it remains a part of the cultural heritage of Scandinavia and serves as a reminder of the rich history and traditions of the Norse people.
People
Karsen + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Karsen 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
Karsen: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Karsen?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 5,057 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Karsen 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 67,778 US residents.
Is Karsen a common name?
We classify Karsen as "Rare". It ranks above 96.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 5,113 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Karsen most popular?
The single biggest year for Karsen was 2010, when 252 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Karsen 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 Karsen in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 3,823 people with the name Karsen, or 1.27 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #4,753 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 Karsen 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 Karsen?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Karsen on both sides of the split. Of the 3,830 people counted with this name, 2,413 were male (63.0%) and 1,417 were female (37.0%). 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 Karsen?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Karsen is White at 77.2%. The next largest groups are Black (11.2%) and Two or More Races (5.3%). 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 Karsen most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Karsen in the 2020 Census, accounting for 77.2% (2,950 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 Karsen in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Karsen a male name?
Yes, 66.3% of people registered as Karsen 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 Karsen still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Karsen 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 Karsen 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 the name Karsen?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.