Lord
A masculine name denoting authority or supreme power.
Name Census estimates that about 602 living Americans carry the first name Lord. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Lord today is around 27 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Lord births was 2021 (29 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Lord. 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 Lord with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
602
~ 1 in 569,359 Americans
Peak year
2021
29 babies that year
Average age
27
years old
2024 SSA rank
#6,327
Tracked since 1917
Census
Lord in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 758 people with the first name Lord, which placed it at #15,241 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
#15,241
National first-name rank
People counted
758
758 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
52.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Lord
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Lord is Black at 52.8%. The next largest groups are White (19.8%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (11.3%). 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 Lord 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 Lord at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American52.8% · 400
- White19.8% · 150
- Asian and Pacific Islander11.3% · 86
- Hispanic or Latino9.8% · 74
- Two or more races5.7% · 43
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.7% · 5
Popularity
Lord: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Lord 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 130 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Lord remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Lord 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 Lord during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Lords live
Origin
Meaning and history of Lord
The given name Lord is derived from the Old English word "hlaford", which means "bread keeper" or "loaf keeper". It originated as a title of respect and authority in Anglo-Saxon England, referring to someone who had dominion over a household or estate.
The name Lord has its roots in the 5th to 11th centuries AD, during the Anglo-Saxon period in Britain. It was initially used as a title for men of high social status, such as noblemen, landowners, and rulers. Over time, it became a common given name, particularly among the upper classes.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Lord appears in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, a historical record of events in Anglo-Saxon England. The chronicle mentions several individuals with the name Lord, including Lord Ælfric, a prominent Anglo-Saxon abbot and scholar who lived from around 955 to 1010 AD.
Another notable historical figure with the name Lord was Lord Byron, the famous English Romantic poet born in 1788. His full name was George Gordon Byron, and he was also known as Lord Byron due to his aristocratic lineage. Lord Byron's poetry and personal life captured the imagination of the literary world during the early 19th century.
In the realm of religion, the name Lord holds significance as a title for God or a supreme being. The Bible, for instance, often refers to God as "the Lord" or "Lord God". This usage of the name Lord reflects its connotation of authority and sovereignty.
During the Middle Ages, the name Lord was commonly used by European nobility and aristocracy. One example is Lord Walter Fitzalan, who lived from around 1107 to 1176 and was a prominent Anglo-Norman nobleman and High Sheriff of Shropshire in England.
In more recent history, Lord Kitchener, born in 1850, was a British Field Marshal and statesman who played a significant role in the Boer War and World War I. His full name was Herbert Kitchener, 1st Earl Kitchener, and he was widely known as Lord Kitchener.
Throughout its long history, the name Lord has carried a sense of power, authority, and leadership. While its usage as a given name has declined in modern times, it remains a testament to the rich cultural heritage and social structures of the past.
People
Lord + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Lord 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
Lord: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Lord?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 602 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Lord 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 569,359 US residents.
Is Lord a common name?
We classify Lord as "Very Rare". It ranks above 86.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 668 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Lord most popular?
The single biggest year for Lord was 2021, when 29 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Lord is about 27 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Lord in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 758 people with the name Lord, or 0.25 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #15,241 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 Lord 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 Lord?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Lord leans strongly male. 699 people counted with this name were male (92.8%), compared with 54 female bearers (7.2%). 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 Lord?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Lord is Black at 52.8%. The next largest groups are White (19.8%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (11.3%). 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 Lord most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Lord in the 2020 Census, accounting for 52.8% (400 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 Lord in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Lord a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Lord 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 Lord still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Lord 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 Lord 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 share the name Lord?
Want to know how many Americans are named Lord? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.