Louie
A French diminutive form of Louis, meaning "renowned warrior".
Name Census estimates that about 16,786 living Americans carry the first name Louie. It is a predominantly male name (93.0% of registrations). The average person named Louie today is around 47 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Louie births was 2024 (514 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Louie. 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 Louie with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
17K
~ 1 in 20,419 Americans
Peak year
2024
514 babies that year
Average age
47
years old
2024 SSA rank
#574
Tracked since 1880
Census
Louie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 14,881 people with the first name Louie, which placed it at #1,906 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
#1,906
National first-name rank
People counted
15K
14,881 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
4.9
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
46.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Louie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Louie is White at 46.7%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (35.1%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (9.1%). 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 Louie 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 Louie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White46.7% · 6,956
- Hispanic or Latino35.1% · 5,225
- Asian and Pacific Islander9.1% · 1,356
- Black or African American4.8% · 717
- Two or more races2.6% · 383
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.6% · 244
Gender
Gender distribution for Louie
Louie leans heavily male at 93.0% of total registrations, but 2,311 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Louie as a male name
- Ranked #574 in 2024
- 497 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (497 births)
Louie as a female name
- Ranked #6,795 in 2024
- 17 female births in 2024
- Peak: 1918 (62 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Louie leans strongly male. 14,529 people counted with this name were male (97.6%), compared with 354 female bearers (2.4%).
Popularity
Louie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Louie from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 4,618 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 1920s peak, Louie remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Louie 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 Louie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Louies live
The SSA's state-level files cover 42 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Louie, while Montana, Maryland, Connecticut recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 580 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Louie
The name Louie finds its origins in the French and German languages. It is a diminutive form of the name Louis, which derived from the Old Frankish "Hlodouuic" or "Hlodowig," meaning "famous warrior." The name gained widespread popularity during the reign of the Frankish king Louis the Pious (778-840 AD), who was also known as Ludwig in German.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Louie can be found in the historical records of the Middle Ages. In the 13th century, there was a French nobleman named Louie de Brienne, who served as a knight and crusader during the Sixth Crusade. Another notable figure was Louis IX, also known as Saint Louis (1214-1270), the King of France who led the Seventh and Eighth Crusades.
Throughout history, several influential figures have borne the name Louie. One of the most famous was Louis XIV of France (1638-1715), known as the Sun King, who reigned for over 72 years and was a significant figure during the Baroque period. Another notable Louie was the American jazz musician and singer Louis Armstrong (1901-1971), who was a pioneering figure in the development of jazz and instrumental in popularizing the genre worldwide.
In the literary world, Louis Braille (1809-1852) was a French educator who invented the Braille system of reading and writing for the blind, revolutionizing education for the visually impaired. Louis Pasteur (1822-1895), a French chemist and microbiologist, made groundbreaking discoveries in the field of germ theory and developed the process of pasteurization, which significantly improved food safety and public health.
The name Louie has also been associated with royalty and nobility. Louis XVI (1754-1793) was the last king of France before the French Revolution, while Louis XVIII (1755-1824) was the first king to rule after the fall of Napoleon Bonaparte. Louis Philippe I (1773-1850) was the last king of France, ruling from 1830 to 1848 before the establishment of the Second Republic.
People
Louie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Louie 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
Louie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Louie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 16,786 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Louie 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 20,419 US residents.
Is Louie a common name?
We classify Louie as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 32,818 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Louie most popular?
The single biggest year for Louie was 2024, when 514 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Louie is about 47 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Louie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 14,881 people with the name Louie, or 4.93 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,906 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 Louie 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 Louie?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Louie leans strongly male. 14,529 people counted with this name were male (97.6%), compared with 354 female bearers (2.4%). 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 Louie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Louie is White at 46.7%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (35.1%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (9.1%). 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 Louie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Louie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 46.7% (6,956 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 Louie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Louie a male name?
Yes, 93.0% of people registered as Louie 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 Louie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Louie 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 Louie 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 Louie?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.