Vega
A name for a bright star in the Lyra constellation.
Name Census estimates that about 879 living Americans carry the first name Vega. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 80.1% of registrations being female. The average person named Vega today is around 12 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Vega births was 2019 (63 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Vega. 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 Vega with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
879
~ 1 in 389,937 Americans
Peak year
2019
63 babies that year
Average age
12
years old
2024 SSA rank
#3,944
Tracked since 1918
Census
Vega in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 867 people with the first name Vega, which placed it at #13,799 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
#13,799
National first-name rank
People counted
867
867 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
44.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Vega
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Vega is White at 44.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (30.9%) and Black (9.1%). 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 Vega 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 Vega at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White44.9% · 389
- Hispanic or Latino30.9% · 268
- Black or African American9.1% · 79
- Two or more races8.0% · 69
- Asian and Pacific Islander5.9% · 51
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.3% · 11
Gender
Gender distribution for Vega
Vega leans heavily female at 80.1% of total registrations, but 178 boys have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Vega as a male name
- Ranked #10,802 in 2024
- 7 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2017 (14 births)
Vega as a female name
- Ranked #3,944 in 2024
- 38 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2019 (52 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Vega on both sides of the split. Of the 867 people counted with this name, 230 were male (26.5%) and 637 were female (73.5%).
Popularity
Vega: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Vega from the 1910s through to the 2020s, spanning 7 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 430 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Vega remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Vega 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 Vega during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Vegas live
Origin
Meaning and history of Vega
The name Vega originates from the Arabic word 'wāqi' which means 'falling' or 'landing'. It is derived from the brightest star in the northern constellation of Lyra, known as Vega. The name's earliest recorded use dates back to the 8th century when Arab astronomers catalogued and named several bright stars in the night sky.
In ancient Arabic texts and astronomical records, the star Vega was referred to as 'al-Nasr al-Wāqi', which translates to 'the Falling Eagle'. This was likely due to the star's position in the sky, appearing to descend towards the horizon during certain times of the year. The name Vega itself is a shortened version of this original Arabic phrase, adopted into Western languages in the early modern era.
One of the earliest known individuals with the name Vega was Vega ibn Yahya al-Nahrisi, an Arabian astronomer and mathematician who lived in the 10th century. He is known for his contributions to the study of trigonometry and his work on improving astronomical calculations.
In the 14th century, the Spanish philosopher and poet Juan Ruiz mentioned the star Vega in his literary work 'Libro de Buen Amor', referring to it as 'la estrella de la guía' (the guiding star).
During the Age of Exploration in the 15th and 16th centuries, the name Vega gained popularity among European navigators and explorers who used the star for celestial navigation. One notable figure was Vega Hernández, a Spanish explorer who accompanied Hernán Cortés on his expedition to Mexico in the early 16th century.
In the 19th century, the name Vega was used by several notable individuals, including Vega García de Villadiego, a Spanish playwright and poet who lived from 1829 to 1891, and Vega Penichet, a Cuban writer and journalist born in 1833.
Another famous bearer of the name was Vega Carpio y Lara, a Spanish poet and playwright from the 17th century, widely regarded as one of the greatest dramatists of the Spanish Golden Age. He was born in 1562 and died in 1635.
People
Vega + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Vega as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with V
Other first names starting with V with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Vega: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Vega?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 879 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Vega 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 389,937 US residents.
Is Vega a common name?
We classify Vega as "Very Rare". It ranks above 89.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 893 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Vega most popular?
The single biggest year for Vega was 2019, when 63 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Vega is about 12 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Vega in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 867 people with the name Vega, or 0.29 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #13,799 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 Vega 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 Vega?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Vega on both sides of the split. Of the 867 people counted with this name, 230 were male (26.5%) and 637 were female (73.5%). 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 Vega?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Vega is White at 44.9%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (30.9%) and Black (9.1%). 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 Vega most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Vega in the 2020 Census, accounting for 44.9% (389 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 Vega in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Vega a female name?
Yes, 80.1% of people registered as Vega 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 Vega still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Vega 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 Vega 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 Vega?
Find out how many Americans are named Vega on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org — a quick modern estimate with the living-bearer count front and centre.