Ramsay
An Old English masculine name derived from "ram", meaning "wild garlic".
Name Census estimates that about 418 living Americans carry the first name Ramsay. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 84.5% of registrations being male. The average person named Ramsay today is around 24 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ramsay births was 2017 (25 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ramsay. 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 Ramsay with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
418
~ 1 in 819,986 Americans
Peak year
2017
25 babies that year
Average age
24
years old
2024 SSA rank
#11,977
Tracked since 1922
Census
Ramsay in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 589 people with the first name Ramsay, which placed it at #18,321 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
#18,321
National first-name rank
People counted
589
589 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
73.3% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ramsay
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ramsay is White at 73.3%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (9.3%) and Two or More Races (7.5%). 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 Ramsay 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 Ramsay at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White73.3% · 432
- Hispanic or Latino9.3% · 55
- Two or more races7.5% · 44
- Black or African American5.3% · 31
- Asian and Pacific Islander4.2% · 25
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.3% · 2
Gender
Gender distribution for Ramsay
Ramsay leans heavily male at 84.5% of total registrations, but 70 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Ramsay as a male name
- Ranked #11,977 in 2024
- 6 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2017 (16 births)
Ramsay as a female name
- Ranked #14,764 in 2023
- 6 female births in 2023
- Peak: 2017 (9 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Ramsay on both sides of the split. Of the 590 people counted with this name, 432 were male (73.2%) and 158 were female (26.8%).
Popularity
Ramsay: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ramsay from the 1920s through to the 2020s, spanning 11 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 122 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Ramsay remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ramsay 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 Ramsay during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ramsays live
Origin
Meaning and history of Ramsay
The name Ramsay has its origins in the Old English language and is derived from the words "ram" and "ey", meaning "ram's island" or "ram's meadow". It is believed to have first emerged as a surname in the 11th century in northern England and southern Scotland.
One of the earliest recorded uses of the name Ramsay can be found in the Domesday Book of 1086, which was a survey of much of England and Wales commissioned by William the Conqueror. The name appeared as a place name, referring to various locations in northern England.
In the 12th century, the name Ramsay became associated with a noble Scottish family who traced their ancestry back to a knight named Simundus de Ramsay. This family played a significant role in Scottish history, with members serving as advisors and military leaders to several Scottish kings.
The first notable person to bear the name Ramsay was Sir Alexander Ramsay (c. 1275-1342), a Scottish nobleman and military commander who fought in the Wars of Scottish Independence against the English. He was instrumental in the victory at the Battle of Bannockburn in 1314 and was later appointed as the Guardian of Scotland during the minority of King David II.
Another prominent bearer of the name was Allan Ramsay (1686-1758), a Scottish poet and writer who was a leading figure in the 18th-century literary revival in Scotland. He is best known for his pastoral comedy "The Gentle Shepherd" and his collection of Scottish proverbs titled "A Collection of Scots Proverbs".
In the 19th century, Sir William Ramsay (1852-1916) was a Scottish chemist who won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1904 for his discovery of the noble gases. He is widely regarded as one of the most influential chemists of his time and made significant contributions to the understanding of the periodic table and the nature of atoms.
Another notable bearer of the name was Ramsay MacDonald (1866-1937), a British politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1924 to 1935. He was the first Labour Party leader to become Prime Minister and played a pivotal role in shaping the party's policies and ideology.
In more recent times, the name Ramsay has been associated with Gordon Ramsay (born 1966), the famous British chef and television personality known for his fiery temper and high standards in the kitchen. He has starred in numerous cooking shows and has written several books on cuisine and cooking techniques.
People
Ramsay + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ramsay 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
Ramsay: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ramsay?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 418 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ramsay 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 819,986 US residents.
Is Ramsay a common name?
We classify Ramsay as "Very Rare". It ranks above 82.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 451 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ramsay most popular?
The single biggest year for Ramsay was 2017, when 25 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ramsay is about 24 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ramsay in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 589 people with the name Ramsay, or 0.20 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #18,321 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 Ramsay 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 Ramsay?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Ramsay on both sides of the split. Of the 590 people counted with this name, 432 were male (73.2%) and 158 were female (26.8%). 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 Ramsay?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ramsay is White at 73.3%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (9.3%) and Two or More Races (7.5%). 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 Ramsay most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Ramsay in the 2020 Census, accounting for 73.3% (432 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 Ramsay in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ramsay a male name?
Yes, 84.5% of people registered as Ramsay 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 Ramsay still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ramsay 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 Ramsay 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 Ramsay?
Find out how many people share the name Ramsay on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org — a quick modern estimate with the living-bearer count front and centre.