Ragen
A Celtic name meaning "brave" or "courageous".
Name Census estimates that about 578 living Americans carry the first name Ragen. It is a predominantly female name (97.5% of registrations). The average person named Ragen today is around 29 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ragen births was 2007 (27 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ragen. 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 Ragen with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
578
~ 1 in 593,001 Americans
Peak year
2007
27 babies that year
Average age
29
years old
1998 SSA rank
#10,908
Tracked since 1973
Census
Ragen in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 669 people with the first name Ragen, which placed it at #16,743 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
#16,743
National first-name rank
People counted
669
669 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
79.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ragen
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ragen is White at 79.2%. The next largest groups are Black (9.9%) and Two or More Races (4.9%). 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 Ragen 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 Ragen at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White79.2% · 530
- Black or African American9.9% · 66
- Two or more races4.9% · 33
- Hispanic or Latino3.3% · 22
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.3% · 9
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.3% · 9
Gender
Gender distribution for Ragen
Ragen leans heavily female at 97.5% of total registrations, but 15 boys have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Ragen as a male name
- Ranked #10,908 in 1998
- 5 male births in 1998
- Peak: 1973 (5 births)
Ragen as a female name
- Ranked #14,854 in 2021
- 6 female births in 2021
- Peak: 2007 (27 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ragen leans strongly female. 561 people counted with this name were female (84.1%), compared with 106 male bearers (15.9%).
Popularity
Ragen: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ragen from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 192 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
Ragen 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 Ragen during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ragens live
Origin
Meaning and history of Ragen
The name Ragen is of Old Norse origin, derived from the Old Norse word "regn," which means "rain." It is believed to have emerged as a name around the 9th or 10th century, during the Viking age, when the Norse peoples inhabited Scandinavia and other parts of Northern Europe.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Ragen can be found in the Icelandic Sagas, a collection of stories written in the 13th and 14th centuries that recount the lives and adventures of the Norse settlers in Iceland. In these sagas, Ragen is mentioned as a male name, often associated with the fierce and courageous warriors of the time.
During the medieval period, the name Ragen was also found in other parts of Northern Europe, particularly in areas with strong Norse influence, such as parts of England and Scotland. It is recorded in some historical documents from this era, although its usage remained relatively rare.
The first notable person in history with the name Ragen was Ragen the Wise, a Norse chieftain and poet who lived in Iceland in the 10th century. He is remembered for his wise counsel and his contributions to the preservation of Norse poetry and legends.
Another famous bearer of the name Ragen was Ragen the Bold, a Viking warrior from Norway who is said to have sailed to the coast of North America in the late 10th century, several centuries before the voyages of Christopher Columbus. While the historical evidence for his journey is limited, Ragen the Bold has become a legendary figure in Norse folklore.
In the 12th century, there was a Ragen the Scribe, a monk from Denmark who is credited with transcribing and preserving several important manuscripts, including some of the earliest known versions of the Norse sagas.
In the 14th century, a Norwegian nobleman named Ragen Eriksson was a prominent figure in the court of King Haakon VI of Norway. He served as a trusted advisor and diplomat, and his name appears in several historical records from that time.
Finally, in the 16th century, there was a Swedish explorer named Ragen Andersson who is believed to have been one of the first Europeans to set foot in what is now Alaska. His journey and discoveries are recorded in some early Swedish travel journals.
While the name Ragen has largely fallen out of use in modern times, it remains an intriguing part of Norse and Scandinavian history, evoking images of the fierce and adventurous Vikings who once roamed the seas and lands of Northern Europe.
People
Ragen + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ragen as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with R
Other first names starting with R with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Ragen: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ragen?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 578 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ragen 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 593,001 US residents.
Is Ragen a common name?
We classify Ragen as "Very Rare". It ranks above 85.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 598 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ragen most popular?
The single biggest year for Ragen was 2007, when 27 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ragen is about 29 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ragen in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 669 people with the name Ragen, or 0.22 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #16,743 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 Ragen 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 Ragen?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ragen leans strongly female. 561 people counted with this name were female (84.1%), compared with 106 male bearers (15.9%). 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 Ragen?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ragen is White at 79.2%. The next largest groups are Black (9.9%) and Two or More Races (4.9%). 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 Ragen most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Ragen in the 2020 Census, accounting for 79.2% (530 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 Ragen in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ragen a female name?
Yes, 97.5% of people registered as Ragen in the SSA data are female. 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 Ragen still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ragen 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 Ragen 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 Ragen?
Want to know how many people share the name Ragen? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.