Shepherd
One who protects, guides, and nurtures others.
Name Census estimates that about 6,111 living Americans carry the first name Shepherd. It sits at #311 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Shepherd today is around 9 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Shepherd births was 2024 (1,104 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Shepherd. 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 Shepherd with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Shepherd is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 9 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
6.1K
~ 1 in 56,088 Americans
Peak year
2024
1,104 babies that year
Average age
9
years old
2024 SSA rank
#311
Tracked since 1886
Census
Shepherd in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,656 people with the first name Shepherd, which placed it at #6,127 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
#6,127
National first-name rank
People counted
2.7K
2,656 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.9
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
81.3% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Shepherd
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shepherd is White at 81.3%. The next largest groups are Black (6.3%) and Two or More Races (5.8%). 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 Shepherd 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 Shepherd at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White81.3% · 2,158
- Black or African American6.3% · 168
- Two or more races5.8% · 153
- Hispanic or Latino4.6% · 121
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.4% · 38
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.7% · 18
Gender
Gender distribution for Shepherd
Out of the 6,392 babies given the name Shepherd since 1880, 99.7% 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.
Shepherd as a male name
- Ranked #311 in 2024
- 1,094 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (1,094 births)
Shepherd as a female name
- Ranked #10,135 in 2024
- 10 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (10 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Shepherd leans strongly male. 2,604 people counted with this name were male (97.7%), compared with 60 female bearers (2.3%).
Popularity
Shepherd: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Shepherd from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 13 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2020s, with 3,538 total registrations. The name continues to be given at rates close to its all-time high, suggesting it has not yet fallen out of fashion.
Babies born per year
Decades
Shepherd 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 Shepherd during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Shepherds live
The SSA's state-level files cover 39 states and territories. Texas, North Carolina, Tennessee recorded the most babies named Shepherd, while New Hampshire, North Dakota, Connecticut recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 129 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Shepherd
The name Shepherd has its roots in the Old English word "sceaphierde," which literally translates to "sheep herder." This occupation became a common surname in medieval England, and eventually evolved into a given name as well. The name is derived from the Anglo-Saxon words "sceap" meaning sheep and "hierde" meaning herd or guardian.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Shepherd can be found in the Domesday Book, a survey of England commissioned by William the Conqueror in 1086. The book lists several individuals with the surname Shepherd, indicating that it was already in use as an occupational surname at that time.
The name Shepherd has a strong biblical connection as well. In the Bible, the occupation of a shepherd is often used as a metaphor for spiritual leadership and guidance. The most famous example is Jesus Christ, who is referred to as the "Good Shepherd" in the Gospel of John.
Throughout history, there have been several notable individuals named Shepherd. One of the earliest was Shepherd of Hermas, a Christian author who lived in Rome in the late 1st or early 2nd century AD. His work, known as "The Shepherd of Hermas," is considered an important early Christian text.
Another prominent figure was Shepherd Knapp, an American educator and author who lived from 1784 to 1838. He was the co-founder of the American Lyceum movement, which aimed to promote adult education and intellectual discourse.
In the realm of literature, Shepherd Stevens (1792-1856) was an American poet and writer who is best known for his work "The Ludlow Massacre," which documented a violent event during the Colorado coal strike of 1914.
In the world of sports, Shepherd Siegel (1919-1998) was an American basketball player who played for the Boston Celtics in the 1940s and was later inducted into the Basketball Hall of Fame.
Finally, Shepherd Munden (1942-2019) was a British actor and director who had a successful career in both film and television, appearing in popular shows like "Doctor Who" and "Sherlock Holmes."
People
Shepherd + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Shepherd 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
Shepherd: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Shepherd?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 6,111 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Shepherd 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 56,088 US residents.
Is Shepherd a common name?
We classify Shepherd as "Rare". It ranks above 96.9% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 6,392 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Shepherd most popular?
The single biggest year for Shepherd was 2024, when 1,104 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Shepherd is about 9 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Shepherd in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,656 people with the name Shepherd, or 0.88 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #6,127 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 Shepherd 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 Shepherd?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Shepherd leans strongly male. 2,604 people counted with this name were male (97.7%), compared with 60 female bearers (2.3%). 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 Shepherd?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shepherd is White at 81.3%. The next largest groups are Black (6.3%) and Two or More Races (5.8%). 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 Shepherd most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Shepherd in the 2020 Census, accounting for 81.3% (2,158 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 Shepherd in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Shepherd a male name?
Yes, 99.7% of people registered as Shepherd 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 Shepherd still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Shepherd 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 Shepherd 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 Shepherd as a first name?
For a quick modern take, check how many Americans are named Shepherd on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.