Marcus
A masculine Roman name derived from Mars, the mythological god of war.
Name Census estimates that about 220,641 living Americans carry the first name Marcus. It sits at #256 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. It is a predominantly male name (99.4% of registrations). The average person named Marcus today is around 36 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Marcus births was 1984 (6,060 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Marcus. 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 Marcus with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Marcus is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 1,342 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
221K
~ 1 in 1,553 Americans
Peak year
1984
6,060 babies that year
Average age
36
years old
2024 SSA rank
#256
Tracked since 1880
Census
Marcus in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 184,052 people with the first name Marcus, which placed it at #301 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
#301
National first-name rank
People counted
184K
184,052 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
60.9
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
41.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Marcus
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Marcus is Black at 41.2%. The next largest groups are White (34.8%) and Hispanic (13.9%). 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 Marcus 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 Marcus at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American41.2% · 75,866
- White34.8% · 64,123
- Hispanic or Latino13.9% · 25,615
- Two or more races6.5% · 11,933
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.4% · 4,481
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 2,034
Gender
Gender distribution for Marcus
Out of the 241,642 babies given the name Marcus since 1880, 99.4% 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.
Marcus as a male name
- Ranked #256 in 2024
- 1,376 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1984 (5,996 births)
Marcus as a female name
- Ranked #16,831 in 2022
- 5 female births in 2022
- Peak: 1983 (67 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Marcus appears almost entirely male. Of the 184,054 people counted with this name, 99.8% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Marcus: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Marcus from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 52,327 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1980s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Marcus 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 Marcus during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Marcus' live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. Texas, California, Illinois recorded the most babies named Marcus, while Vermont, Wyoming, New Hampshire recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 4,637 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Marcus
The name Marcus has its origins in the ancient Roman culture, deriving from the Latin word "Mart-" meaning "consecrated to Mars." It was initially used as a surname or family name in ancient Rome, but later became a common given name.
The earliest recorded instance of Marcus as a given name dates back to the 3rd century BC, when it was borne by the Roman general and statesman Marcus Claudius Marcellus, who lived from 268 BC to 208 BC. He played a crucial role in the Second Punic War against Carthage.
In the 1st century BC, one of the most famous bearers of the name was Marcus Tullius Cicero, the renowned Roman philosopher, statesman, and orator, who lived from 106 BC to 43 BC. His writings and speeches have had a profound influence on Western thought and literature.
Another notable historical figure with the name Marcus was Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor and Stoic philosopher, who ruled from 161 AD to 180 AD. His philosophical work "Meditations" is considered a classic of Stoic literature and has been widely read and studied throughout the centuries.
During the Middle Ages, the name Marcus was less common, but it resurfaced with the Renaissance and the revival of classical learning. One notable bearer of the name from this period was Marcus Musurus, a Greek scholar and humanist who lived from 1470 to 1517 and played a significant role in the spread of Greek learning in Renaissance Europe.
In more recent history, Marcus Garvey, the Jamaican political activist and Black Nationalist leader, who lived from 1887 to 1940, was a prominent figure who bore the name. His advocacy for the rights and empowerment of people of African descent had a lasting impact on the civil rights movement.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Marcus
People
Marcus + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Marcus as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with M
Other first names starting with M with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Marcus: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Marcus?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 220,641 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Marcus 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 1,553 US residents.
Is Marcus a common name?
We classify Marcus as "Common". It ranks above 99.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 241,642 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Marcus most popular?
The single biggest year for Marcus was 1984, when 6,060 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Marcus is about 36 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Marcus in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 184,052 people with the name Marcus, or 60.94 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #301 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 Marcus 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 Marcus?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Marcus appears almost entirely male. Of the 184,054 people counted with this name, 99.8% 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 Marcus?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Marcus is Black at 41.2%. The next largest groups are White (34.8%) and Hispanic (13.9%). 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 Marcus most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Marcus in the 2020 Census, accounting for 41.2% (75,866 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 Marcus in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Marcus a male name?
Yes, 99.4% of people registered as Marcus 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 Marcus still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Marcus 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 Marcus 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 are named Marcus?
Want to know how many people share the name Marcus? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.