Nikolas
Masculine name meaning "victory of the people" from Greek origin.
Name Census estimates that about 23,243 living Americans carry the first name Nikolas. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Nikolas today is around 22 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Nikolas births was 2004 (1,065 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Nikolas. 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 Nikolas with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
23K
~ 1 in 14,747 Americans
Peak year
2004
1,065 babies that year
Average age
22
years old
2024 SSA rank
#725
Tracked since 1937
Census
Nikolas in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 18,363 people with the first name Nikolas, which placed it at #1,688 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
#1,688
National first-name rank
People counted
18K
18,363 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
6.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
62.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Nikolas
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Nikolas is White at 62.0%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (25.3%) and Two or More Races (5.9%). 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 Nikolas 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 Nikolas at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White62.0% · 11,380
- Hispanic or Latino25.3% · 4,642
- Two or more races5.9% · 1,084
- Black or African American4.0% · 741
- Asian and Pacific Islander2.3% · 420
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.5% · 96
Gender
Gender distribution for Nikolas
Out of the 23,673 babies given the name Nikolas 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.
Nikolas as a male name
- Ranked #725 in 2024
- 361 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2004 (1,060 births)
Nikolas as a female name
- Ranked #18,417 in 2005
- 5 female births in 2005
- Peak: 1989 (5 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Nikolas appears almost entirely male. Of the 18,364 people counted with this name, 99.7% were male and only a very small share were female.
Popularity
Nikolas: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Nikolas from the 1930s through to the 2020s, spanning 10 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 7,822 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Nikolas 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 Nikolas during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Nikolas' live
The SSA's state-level files cover 47 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Nikolas, while Delaware, District of Columbia, Montana recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 451 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Nikolas
The given name Nikolas is derived from the Greek name Nikolaos, which is a combination of the Greek words "nikan" meaning "to conquer" and "laos" meaning "people." The name can be translated to mean "victor of the people" or "conqueror of the people." This name originated in ancient Greece and has been in use since the 4th century BC.
The name Nikolas gained popularity in the early Christian era due to its association with Saint Nicholas, a 4th-century Christian saint and Greek bishop of Myra in Lycia, which is now part of modern-day Turkey. Saint Nicholas was renowned for his generosity and became the inspiration for the legendary figure of Santa Claus.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Nikolas can be found in the Septuagint, an ancient Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible, where it appears as the name of one of the leaders who returned to Jerusalem after the Babylonian exile in the 5th century BC.
Throughout history, there have been several notable individuals with the name Nikolas. One of the most famous was Nikolas of Damascus, a Greek historian, philosopher, and tutor to the Roman emperor Augustus in the 1st century BC.
Another prominent figure was Nikolas of Cusa, a 15th-century German philosopher, mathematician, and theologian who made significant contributions to the Renaissance era. He was born in 1401 and died in 1464.
In the realm of literature, Nikolas Gogol, a Russian novelist and dramatist, is widely regarded as one of the most influential writers of the 19th century. He was born in 1809 and died in 1852.
Nikolas Copernicus, the renowned Polish astronomer who formulated the heliocentric model of the solar system, challenging the long-held geocentric model, was born in 1473 and died in 1543.
Nikolas Tesla, a Serbian-American inventor and electrical engineer, is famous for his contributions to the design of the modern alternating current (AC) electricity supply system. He was born in 1856 and died in 1943.
People
Nikolas + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Nikolas as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with N
Other first names starting with N with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Nikolas: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Nikolas?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 23,243 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Nikolas 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 14,747 US residents.
Is Nikolas a common name?
We classify Nikolas as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 23,673 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Nikolas most popular?
The single biggest year for Nikolas was 2004, when 1,065 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Nikolas is about 22 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Nikolas in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 18,363 people with the name Nikolas, or 6.08 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,688 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 Nikolas 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 Nikolas?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Nikolas appears almost entirely male. Of the 18,364 people counted with this name, 99.7% 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 Nikolas?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Nikolas is White at 62.0%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (25.3%) and Two or More Races (5.9%). 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 Nikolas most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Nikolas in the 2020 Census, accounting for 62.0% (11,380 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 Nikolas in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Nikolas a male name?
Yes, 99.9% of people registered as Nikolas 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 Nikolas still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Nikolas 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 Nikolas 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 Americans are named Nikolas?
Want to know how many people have the name Nikolas? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.