Waylin
Uncommon name of uncertain origin, possibly a blend of Celtic elements.
Name Census estimates that about 418 living Americans carry the first name Waylin. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 87.0% of registrations being male. The average person named Waylin today is around 10 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Waylin births was 2023 (38 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Waylin. 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.
People living today
418
~ 1 in 819,986 Americans
Peak year
2023
38 babies that year
Average age
10
years old
2024 SSA rank
#4,543
Tracked since 1978
Census
Waylin in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 314 people with the first name Waylin, which placed it at #28,548 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
#28,548
National first-name rank
People counted
314
314 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
71.3% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Waylin
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Waylin is White at 71.3%. The next largest groups are Black (8.0%) and Hispanic (7.6%). 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 Waylin 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 Waylin at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White71.3% · 224
- Black or African American8.0% · 25
- Hispanic or Latino7.6% · 24
- Two or more races6.1% · 19
- American Indian and Alaska Native3.8% · 12
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.2% · 10
Gender
Gender distribution for Waylin
Waylin leans heavily male at 87.0% of total registrations, but 55 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Waylin as a male name
- Ranked #4,543 in 2024
- 23 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2023 (32 births)
Waylin as a female name
- Ranked #13,343 in 2024
- 7 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2021 (12 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Waylin leans strongly male. 287 people counted with this name were male (89.4%), compared with 34 female bearers (10.6%).
Popularity
Waylin: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Waylin from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 207 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Waylin remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Waylin 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 Waylin during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Waylins live
Origin
Meaning and history of Waylin
The name Waylin is of Old English origin and dates back to the 5th century AD. It is derived from the Old English words "waeg" meaning "way" or "path" and "linn" meaning "pool" or "lake." The name can therefore be interpreted as "one who lives by the lake" or "one who travels the path near the lake."
In ancient Anglo-Saxon texts, the name was sometimes spelled as "Wæglinn" or "Wæglynne." It was a relatively common name among the Anglo-Saxon populations of what is now England during the Middle Ages.
One of the earliest recorded individuals with the name Waylin was a monk named Waylin of Lindisfarne, who lived in the 7th century AD on the island of Lindisfarne off the northeast coast of England. He is mentioned in the Venerable Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People as a member of the monastic community there.
In the 9th century, a nobleman named Waylin of Mercia was a prominent figure in the Kingdom of Mercia, one of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of what is now central England. He is recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as participating in battles against the Danish Vikings who were invading England at that time.
During the Norman conquest of England in the 11th century, a knight named Waylin de Beaumont fought alongside William the Conqueror at the Battle of Hastings in 1066. He was later granted lands in Leicestershire and is mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086.
In the 12th century, a poet and scholar named Waylin of Canterbury was active in the city of Canterbury in southern England. He is known for his collection of Anglo-Norman poetry and his translations of Latin texts into the Anglo-Norman language.
In the 13th century, a Franciscan friar named Waylin of Oxford was a prominent theologian and philosopher at the University of Oxford. He wrote several treatises on logic and metaphysics that were influential during the Scholastic period.
People
Waylin + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Waylin as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with W
Other first names starting with W with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Waylin: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Waylin?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 418 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Waylin 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 819,986 US residents.
Is Waylin a common name?
We classify Waylin as "Very Rare". It ranks above 82.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 422 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Waylin most popular?
The single biggest year for Waylin was 2023, when 38 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Waylin is about 10 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Waylin in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 314 people with the name Waylin, or 0.10 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #28,548 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 Waylin 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 Waylin?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Waylin leans strongly male. 287 people counted with this name were male (89.4%), compared with 34 female bearers (10.6%). 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 Waylin?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Waylin is White at 71.3%. The next largest groups are Black (8.0%) and Hispanic (7.6%). 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 Waylin most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Waylin in the 2020 Census, accounting for 71.3% (224 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 Waylin in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Waylin a male name?
Yes, 87.0% of people registered as Waylin 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 Waylin still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Waylin 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 Waylin 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 Waylin as a first name?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.