Susanna
A feminine name of Hebrew origin meaning "lily" or "rose".
Name Census estimates that about 14,673 living Americans carry the first name Susanna. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Susanna today is around 41 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Susanna births was 1958 (310 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Susanna. 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 Susanna with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
15K
~ 1 in 23,360 Americans
Peak year
1958
310 babies that year
Average age
41
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,360
Tracked since 1880
Census
Susanna in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 18,585 people with the first name Susanna, which placed it at #1,674 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
#1,674
National first-name rank
People counted
19K
18,585 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
6.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Susanna
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Susanna is White at 65.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (19.3%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (9.4%). 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 Susanna 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 Susanna at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.9% · 12,240
- Hispanic or Latino19.3% · 3,579
- Asian and Pacific Islander9.4% · 1,747
- Two or more races2.9% · 531
- Black or African American2.1% · 389
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.5% · 99
Popularity
Susanna: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Susanna from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 2,496 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 1980s peak, Susanna remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Susanna 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 Susanna during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Susannas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 39 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Susanna, while South Dakota, Idaho, Alaska recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 327 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Susanna
The name Susanna has its origins in the Hebrew language and culture. It is derived from the Hebrew name Shoshannah, which means "lily" or "rose." The name was adopted into Greek as Susanna and later into Latin and other European languages.
Susanna is mentioned in the Bible's Book of Daniel, where she is described as a beautiful and virtuous woman who was falsely accused of adultery. Her story is told in the apocryphal addition to the Book of Daniel known as the History of Susanna.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Susanna is in the New Testament, where it is mentioned as the name of one of the women who ministered to Jesus and his disciples (Luke 8:3). This suggests that the name was in use among Jewish communities during the 1st century AD.
In the early Christian era, Susanna became a popular name among believers, particularly in the Greek-speaking regions of the Roman Empire. Several early Christian martyrs bore the name, including Saint Susanna, a Roman martyr who lived in the 3rd century AD.
Throughout history, several notable women have borne the name Susanna. One of the earliest was Susanna of Bavaria (1502-1543), a Bavarian princess and the wife of Casimir, Margrave of Brandenburg-Bayreuth. Another was Susanna Arteaga (1591-1652), a Spanish nun and mystic who founded the Order of the Servants of Mary.
In the 17th century, the name gained prominence in England with the writer Susanna Centlivre (1667-1723), one of the most successful playwrights of her time. Another notable Susanna was Susanna Wesley (1669-1742), the mother of John and Charles Wesley, the founders of Methodism.
In the 18th century, the German composer Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) wrote a sacred cantata titled "Susanna a Sancta Maria," based on the story of Susanna from the Book of Daniel. This work contributed to the popularity of the name in Germany and other parts of Europe.
Other notable figures named Susanna include the British author Susanna Moodie (1803-1885), who wrote about her experiences as a settler in Canada, and Susanna Salter (1860-1961), the first woman elected mayor in the United States, serving in Argonia, Kansas.
People
Susanna + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Susanna 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
Susanna: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Susanna?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 14,673 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Susanna 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 23,360 US residents.
Is Susanna a common name?
We classify Susanna as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 19,782 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Susanna most popular?
The single biggest year for Susanna was 1958, when 310 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Susanna is about 41 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Susanna in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 18,585 people with the name Susanna, or 6.15 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,674 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 Susanna 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 Susanna?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Susanna appears almost entirely female. Of the 18,587 people counted with this name, 99.9% were female and only a very small share were male. 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 Susanna?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Susanna is White at 65.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (19.3%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (9.4%). 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 Susanna most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Susanna in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.9% (12,240 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 Susanna in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Susanna a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Susanna 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 Susanna still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Susanna 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 Susanna 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 Susanna?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many Americans are named Susanna at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.