Shadrach
A male name of Hebrew origin meaning "servant of Aku" (the Babylonian god).
Name Census estimates that about 744 living Americans carry the first name Shadrach. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Shadrach today is around 26 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Shadrach births was 2008 (26 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Shadrach. 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 Shadrach with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
744
~ 1 in 460,691 Americans
Peak year
2008
26 babies that year
Average age
26
years old
2024 SSA rank
#7,166
Tracked since 1916
Census
Shadrach in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 729 people with the first name Shadrach, which placed it at #15,699 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
#15,699
National first-name rank
People counted
729
729 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
44.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Shadrach
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shadrach is Black at 44.6%. The next largest groups are White (32.6%) and Hispanic (8.2%). 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 Shadrach 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 Shadrach at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American44.6% · 325
- White32.6% · 238
- Hispanic or Latino8.2% · 60
- Asian and Pacific Islander7.3% · 53
- Two or more races6.2% · 45
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 8
Popularity
Shadrach: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Shadrach from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 10 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 197 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2000s peak, Shadrach remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Shadrach 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 Shadrach during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Shadrachs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 3 states and territories. New York, Texas, Utah recorded the most babies named Shadrach, while Utah, Texas, New York recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 5 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Shadrach
The given name Shadrach has its origins in the ancient Semitic languages of the Middle East. It is a biblical name that first appears in the Book of Daniel from the Hebrew Bible and the Old Testament. The name is derived from the Akkadian word "Shudur-Aku," which means "command of Aku," with Aku being the name of the Babylonian god of wisdom and light.
In the Book of Daniel, Shadrach is one of the three Hebrew men, along with Meshach and Abednego, who refused to worship the golden idol erected by King Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. As punishment, they were thrown into a fiery furnace, but they were miraculously saved by divine intervention. This biblical story has made Shadrach a symbolic name representing faith, courage, and deliverance from trials.
The earliest recorded use of the name Shadrach dates back to the 6th century BCE during the Babylonian captivity of the Hebrews. Throughout history, the name has been borne by several notable individuals, including:
1. Shadrach Furlong (1630-1712), an English Quaker preacher and writer from Wiltshire, England.
2. Shadrach Sweeten (1768-1835), an American Revolutionary War soldier and frontiersman from Pennsylvania.
3. Shadrach Bassett (1798-1886), an American politician who served as a United States Senator from Connecticut.
4. Shadrach Minkins (c. 1814-1875), an African American fugitive slave whose legal case in 1851 became a significant event in the abolitionist movement in the United States.
5. Shadrach Woods (1923-2008), an American blues singer and guitarist from Mississippi, known for his work with Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters.
Throughout its history, the name Shadrach has been associated with resilience, faith, and overcoming adversity, drawing inspiration from the biblical story of the three men who survived the fiery furnace. It has been used across different cultures and religions, with varying spellings and pronunciations, but its symbolic meaning has remained consistent over time.
People
Shadrach + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Shadrach as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with S
Other first names starting with S with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Shadrach: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Shadrach?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 744 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Shadrach 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 460,691 US residents.
Is Shadrach a common name?
We classify Shadrach as "Very Rare". It ranks above 88% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 775 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Shadrach most popular?
The single biggest year for Shadrach was 2008, when 26 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Shadrach is about 26 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Shadrach in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 729 people with the name Shadrach, or 0.24 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #15,699 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 Shadrach 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 Shadrach?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Shadrach appears almost entirely male. Of the 728 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 Shadrach?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shadrach is Black at 44.6%. The next largest groups are White (32.6%) and Hispanic (8.2%). 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 Shadrach most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Shadrach in the 2020 Census, accounting for 44.6% (325 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 Shadrach in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Shadrach a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Shadrach 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 Shadrach still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Shadrach 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 Shadrach 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 Shadrach as a first name?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.