Leif
An Old Norse masculine name meaning "descendant" or "heir".
Name Census estimates that about 8,884 living Americans carry the first name Leif. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Leif today is around 30 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Leif births was 2022 (290 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Leif. 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 Leif with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
8.9K
~ 1 in 38,581 Americans
Peak year
2022
290 babies that year
Average age
30
years old
2024 SSA rank
#925
Tracked since 1912
Census
Leif in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 7,701 people with the first name Leif, which placed it at #2,934 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
#2,934
National first-name rank
People counted
7.7K
7,701 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
2.5
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
87.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Leif
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Leif is White at 87.1%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (5.3%) and Hispanic (4.4%). 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 Leif 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 Leif at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White87.1% · 6,706
- Two or more races5.3% · 410
- Hispanic or Latino4.4% · 338
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.4% · 105
- Black or African American1.2% · 96
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.6% · 46
Gender
Gender distribution for Leif
Out of the 9,742 babies given the name Leif since 1880, 99.9% 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.
Leif as a male name
- Ranked #925 in 2024
- 250 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2022 (290 births)
Leif as a female name
- Ranked #11,328 in 1981
- 5 female births in 1981
- Peak: 1981 (5 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Leif appears almost entirely male. Of the 7,704 people counted with this name, 99.3% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Leif: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Leif from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 12 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 1,971 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Leif remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Leif 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 Leif during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Leifs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 40 states and territories. California, Washington, Minnesota recorded the most babies named Leif, while Vermont, South Dakota, New Mexico recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 135 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Leif
The name Leif is a given name of Old Norse origin. It is derived from the Old Norse word "leifr" which means "descendant" or "heir". The name was popular among the Vikings and was used throughout Scandinavia, particularly in Norway, Sweden, and Denmark, during the 8th to 11th centuries.
Leif is the name of one of the most famous Vikings in history, Leif Erikson, who was the first European to set foot on the North American continent around the year 1000 CE. He was the son of Erik the Red, a Norwegian explorer who established the first European settlement in Greenland. Leif Erikson's voyage to North America is recorded in the Icelandic Sagas, which are historical narratives written in the 13th century.
Another notable bearer of the name was Leif Ericson, a Swedish explorer and writer who lived from 1829 to 1896. He was one of the first Europeans to explore the interior of Western Australia and wrote several books about his adventures.
In the realm of literature, Leif features as the name of a character in the epic poem "The Saga of Burnt Njal", which is considered one of the greatest works of medieval Icelandic literature and was composed around the year 1300.
Leif was also the name of a Norwegian king who ruled from 1299 to 1319. Known as Haakon V Magnusson, he was the son of King Magnus III and was given the nickname "Leif" which means "the beloved".
One of the earliest recorded bearers of the name was Leif Arnesson, a Norwegian chieftain and explorer who lived in the 9th century. He is mentioned in the Icelandic Sagas as one of the first Norwegians to explore and settle in Iceland.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Leif
People
Leif + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Leif as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with L
Other first names starting with L with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Leif: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Leif?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 8,884 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Leif 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 38,581 US residents.
Is Leif a common name?
We classify Leif as "Rare". It ranks above 97.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 9,742 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Leif most popular?
The single biggest year for Leif was 2022, when 290 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Leif is about 30 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Leif in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 7,701 people with the name Leif, or 2.55 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #2,934 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 Leif 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 Leif?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Leif appears almost entirely male. Of the 7,704 people counted with this name, 99.3% 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 Leif?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Leif is White at 87.1%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (5.3%) and Hispanic (4.4%). 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 Leif most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Leif in the 2020 Census, accounting for 87.1% (6,706 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 Leif in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Leif a male name?
Yes, 99.9% of people registered as Leif 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 Leif still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Leif 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 Leif 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 Leif as a first name?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.