Patterson
A masculine given name derived from Patrick, meaning "noble" or "patrician".
Name Census estimates that about 398 living Americans carry the first name Patterson. It is a predominantly male name (96.4% of registrations). The average person named Patterson today is around 35 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Patterson births was 2010 (19 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Patterson. 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.
People living today
398
~ 1 in 861,192 Americans
Peak year
2010
19 babies that year
Average age
35
years old
2023 SSA rank
#10,513
Tracked since 1912
Census
Patterson in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 678 people with the first name Patterson, which placed it at #16,581 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
#16,581
National first-name rank
People counted
678
678 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
60.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Patterson
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Patterson is White at 60.8%. The next largest groups are Black (22.6%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (5.3%). 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 Patterson 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 Patterson at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White60.8% · 412
- Black or African American22.6% · 153
- Asian and Pacific Islander5.3% · 36
- American Indian and Alaska Native4.6% · 31
- Two or more races3.8% · 26
- Hispanic or Latino2.9% · 20
Gender
Gender distribution for Patterson
Patterson leans heavily male at 96.4% of total registrations, but 20 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Patterson as a male name
- Ranked #10,513 in 2023
- 7 male births in 2023
- Peak: 2013 (16 births)
Patterson as a female name
- Ranked #18,556 in 2014
- 5 female births in 2014
- Peak: 1993 (5 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Patterson on both sides of the split. Of the 670 people counted with this name, 513 were male (76.6%) and 157 were female (23.4%).
Popularity
Patterson: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Patterson 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 121 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2010s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Patterson 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 Patterson during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Patterson
The name Patterson is a patronymic surname originating from the personal name Pàtraic, an Irish name derived from the Latin name Patricius meaning "of the patrician class" or "noble". It first appeared as a surname in England and Scotland in the 12th century.
Patronymic surnames were common in medieval times, indicating a person was the son of someone with a given name. In this case, Patterson means "son of Patrick". The name is believed to have originated in Northumberland, England and later spread to Scotland and Ireland.
The earliest recorded use of the name Patterson dates back to 1189 in the Pipe Rolls of Yorkshire, England, where it appears as "Patericsoune". In Scotland, the name is first recorded in 1296 in the Ragman Rolls, a record of Scottish nobles and landowners who swore allegiance to King Edward I of England.
One of the earliest notable figures with the name Patterson was William Patterson, a Scottish merchant and banker born in 1658. He was one of the founders of the Bank of England and played a crucial role in the establishment of the Darien Scheme, an unsuccessful attempt to establish a Scottish colony in Panama.
Another famous Patterson was Andrew Patterson, an American military officer born in 1776. He served in the War of 1812 and later became a Major General in the United States Army. He is remembered for his role in the Battle of New Orleans and the defense of New Orleans during the War of 1812.
In the field of literature, John Patterson, a Scottish-born Canadian author born in 1867, is notable for his works exploring the lives of early settlers in Canada. His novel "The Man from Glengarry" is considered a classic of Canadian literature.
Robert Wilson Patterson, born in 1857, was a prominent American educator and academic administrator. He served as the president of the State College of Kentucky (now the University of Kentucky) from 1890 to 1910 and played a significant role in the development of higher education in the state.
Lastly, Robert P. Patterson, born in 1892, was an American lawyer and government official who served as the United States Secretary of War from 1945 to 1947, overseeing the final stages of World War II and the transition to peacetime operations.
People
Patterson + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Patterson as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with P
Other first names starting with P with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Patterson: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Patterson?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 398 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Patterson 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 861,192 US residents.
Is Patterson a common name?
We classify Patterson as "Very Rare". It ranks above 82.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 554 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Patterson most popular?
The single biggest year for Patterson was 2010, when 19 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Patterson is about 35 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Patterson in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 678 people with the name Patterson, or 0.22 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #16,581 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 Patterson 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 Patterson?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Patterson on both sides of the split. Of the 670 people counted with this name, 513 were male (76.6%) and 157 were female (23.4%). 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 Patterson?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Patterson is White at 60.8%. The next largest groups are Black (22.6%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (5.3%). 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 Patterson most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Patterson in the 2020 Census, accounting for 60.8% (412 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 Patterson in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Patterson a male name?
Yes, 96.4% of people registered as Patterson 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 Patterson still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Patterson 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 Patterson 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 the name Patterson?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.