Vinnie
Diminutive form of Vincent, derived from Latin meaning "conquering".
Name Census estimates that about 1,395 living Americans carry the first name Vinnie. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 79.5% of registrations being female. The average person named Vinnie today is around 51 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Vinnie births was 1916 (66 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Vinnie. 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 Vinnie with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Vinnie was once a predominantly female name but has become increasingly popular for boys in recent decades.
People living today
1.4K
~ 1 in 245,702 Americans
Peak year
1916
66 babies that year
Average age
51
years old
2024 SSA rank
#5,857
Tracked since 1880
Census
Vinnie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,036 people with the first name Vinnie, which placed it at #7,486 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
#7,486
National first-name rank
People counted
2.0K
2,036 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
51.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Vinnie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Vinnie is White at 51.9%. The next largest groups are Black (20.2%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (13.1%). 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 Vinnie 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 Vinnie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White51.9% · 1,056
- Black or African American20.2% · 411
- Asian and Pacific Islander13.1% · 267
- Hispanic or Latino10.7% · 217
- Two or more races3.1% · 64
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.0% · 21
Gender
Gender distribution for Vinnie
Vinnie is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 3,918 total registrations, 805 (20.5%) were male and 3,113 (79.5%) were female.
Vinnie as a male name
- Ranked #5,857 in 2024
- 16 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1989 (26 births)
Vinnie as a female name
- Ranked #12,037 in 2024
- 8 female births in 2024
- Peak: 1916 (66 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Vinnie on both sides of the split. Of the 2,036 people counted with this name, 1,264 were male (62.1%) and 772 were female (37.9%).
Popularity
Vinnie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Vinnie from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 477 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1920s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Vinnie 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 Vinnie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Vinnies live
The SSA's state-level files cover 13 states and territories. Georgia, Alabama, New York recorded the most babies named Vinnie, while Arkansas, Kentucky, Virginia recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 44 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Vinnie
The name Vinnie is a diminutive form of the Italian name Vincenzo, derived from the Late Latin name Vincentius. Vincentius itself is derived from the Latin word "vincere," meaning "to conquer" or "to overcome." The name can be traced back to the early Christian period, when it was given in honor of the celebrated 3rd-century martyr Saint Vincent of Saragossa.
Vinnie has its roots in the ancient Roman Empire, where it was initially used as a cognomen or nickname. The earliest recorded use of the name Vincenzo dates back to the 4th century AD, when it appeared in various Italian ecclesiastical records. During the Middle Ages, the name became popular across Europe, particularly in Italy, France, and Spain.
One of the earliest notable figures bearing the name was Vincenzo di Beauvais (c. 1190-1264), a Dominican friar and scholar who authored the influential encyclopedia "Speculum Maius." Another prominent historical figure was Vincenzo Galilei (c. 1520-1591), an Italian lutenist, composer, and father of the famous astronomer Galileo Galilei.
In the 16th century, the name gained further prominence with the artist Vincenzo Campi (c. 1536-1591), a prominent painter of the Cremonese School in Italy. During the Renaissance period, the name was also borne by Vincenzo Scamozzi (c. 1548-1616), a renowned Venetian architect who designed various notable buildings, including the Procuratie Nuove in Venice.
In the 19th century, the name was associated with the Italian composer Vincenzo Bellini (1801-1835), best known for his operas "Norma" and "La Sonnambula." Another notable figure was Vincenzo Gioberti (1801-1852), an Italian philosopher and political theorist who played a significant role in the Risorgimento movement for Italian unification.
As the name Vinnie gained popularity in English-speaking countries, it became associated with various notable individuals, such as Vinnie Barbarino, a character portrayed by John Travolta in the 1970s TV series "Welcome Back, Kotter." In the world of sports, Vinnie Johnson (born 1956) was a professional basketball player who won two NBA championships with the Detroit Pistons.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Vinnie
People
Vinnie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Vinnie 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
Vinnie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Vinnie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 1,395 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Vinnie 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 245,702 US residents.
Is Vinnie a common name?
We classify Vinnie as "Rare". It ranks above 92% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 3,918 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Vinnie most popular?
The single biggest year for Vinnie was 1916, when 66 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Vinnie is about 51 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Vinnie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,036 people with the name Vinnie, or 0.67 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #7,486 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 Vinnie 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 Vinnie?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Vinnie on both sides of the split. Of the 2,036 people counted with this name, 1,264 were male (62.1%) and 772 were female (37.9%). 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 Vinnie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Vinnie is White at 51.9%. The next largest groups are Black (20.2%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (13.1%). 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 Vinnie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Vinnie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 51.9% (1,056 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 Vinnie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Vinnie a female name?
Yes, 79.5% of people registered as Vinnie 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 Vinnie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Vinnie 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 Vinnie 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 Vinnie?
If you just want to know how many Americans are named Vinnie, HowManyOfMe.org gives you the headline number in one glance.