Teressa
A feminine name of Greek origin meaning "harvester" or "reaper".
Name Census estimates that about 5,033 living Americans carry the first name Teressa. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Teressa today is around 57 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Teressa births was 1960 (266 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Teressa. 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 Teressa with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
5.0K
~ 1 in 68,101 Americans
Peak year
1960
266 babies that year
Average age
57
years old
2024 SSA rank
#17,394
Tracked since 1880
Census
Teressa in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 5,443 people with the first name Teressa, which placed it at #3,720 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
#3,720
National first-name rank
People counted
5.4K
5,443 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.8
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Teressa
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Teressa is White at 65.8%. The next largest groups are Black (21.3%) and Hispanic (7.3%). 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 Teressa 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 Teressa at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.8% · 3,584
- Black or African American21.3% · 1,160
- Hispanic or Latino7.3% · 396
- Two or more races3.5% · 192
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 59
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.0% · 52
Popularity
Teressa: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Teressa from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1960s, with 2,229 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1960s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Teressa 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 Teressa during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Teressas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 30 states and territories. North Carolina, Texas, Georgia recorded the most babies named Teressa, while New Mexico, Idaho, District of Columbia recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 122 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Teressa
The name Teressa has its origins in the Latin language and can be traced back to ancient Rome. It is a feminine form of the name Terence, which is derived from the Latin word "Terrentius" or "Terentius." This name is believed to have come from the Roman family name "Terentius," which may have originated from the Etruscan word "teren," meaning "tender" or "delicate."
In the early Christian era, the name Teressa gained popularity as a variation of the name Teresa, which was borne by Saint Teresa of Ávila, a prominent Spanish mystic and reformer who lived in the 16th century (1515-1582). Saint Teresa was known for her role in the Counter-Reformation and for founding several reformed Carmelite convents.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Teressa can be found in the writings of the Italian poet and philosopher Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), who mentioned a character named Teressa in his famous work, "The Divine Comedy."
Over the centuries, the name Teressa has been carried by several notable individuals. One such example is Teressa Bellissimo (1937-2018), an American actress and singer who appeared in numerous television shows and films in the 1960s and 1970s.
Another prominent figure with this name is Teressa Renee Graves (1948-2003), an American educator and civil rights activist who played a significant role in the desegregation of public schools in Little Rock, Arkansas, during the late 1950s.
In the literary world, Teressa Jennings (1940-2008) was an American writer and poet who published several collections of poetry and received numerous awards for her work.
Teressa Longo (1910-1998) was an Italian-American labor organizer and activist who fought for workers' rights and played a pivotal role in the rise of the American labor movement in the mid-20th century.
Lastly, Teressa Ríos (1917-2000) was a Mexican-American author and educator who wrote extensively about Mexican-American culture and history, contributing to the Chicano literary canon.
People
Teressa + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Teressa as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with T
Other first names starting with T with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Teressa: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Teressa?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 5,033 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Teressa 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 68,101 US residents.
Is Teressa a common name?
We classify Teressa as "Rare". It ranks above 96.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 6,475 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Teressa most popular?
The single biggest year for Teressa was 1960, when 266 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Teressa is about 57 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Teressa in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 5,443 people with the name Teressa, or 1.80 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #3,720 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 Teressa 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 Teressa?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Teressa appears almost entirely female. Of the 5,440 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 Teressa?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Teressa is White at 65.8%. The next largest groups are Black (21.3%) and Hispanic (7.3%). 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 Teressa most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Teressa in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.8% (3,584 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 Teressa in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Teressa a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Teressa 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 Teressa still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Teressa 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 Teressa 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 the name Teressa?
See how many Americans are named Teressa on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.