Wilson
A masculine English name derived from the surname meaning "son of Will".
Name Census estimates that about 28,231 living Americans carry the first name Wilson. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Wilson today is around 40 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Wilson births was 1918 (1,381 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Wilson. 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 Wilson with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Wilson is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 210 girls registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
28K
~ 1 in 12,141 Americans
Peak year
1918
1,381 babies that year
Average age
40
years old
2024 SSA rank
#644
Tracked since 1880
Census
Wilson in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 39,892 people with the first name Wilson, which placed it at #1,052 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
#1,052
National first-name rank
People counted
40K
39,892 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
13.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
39.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Wilson
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Wilson is Hispanic at 39.7%. The next largest groups are White (32.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (13.5%). 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 Wilson 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 Wilson at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino39.7% · 15,826
- White32.4% · 12,912
- Asian and Pacific Islander13.5% · 5,379
- Black or African American11.9% · 4,735
- Two or more races1.5% · 589
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.1% · 451
Gender
Gender distribution for Wilson
Out of the 48,613 babies given the name Wilson since 1880, 99.6% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Wilson as a male name
- Ranked #644 in 2024
- 431 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1918 (1,381 births)
Wilson as a female name
- Ranked #15,131 in 2021
- 6 female births in 2021
- Peak: 2001 (10 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Wilson leans strongly male. 39,489 people counted with this name were male (99.0%), compared with 406 female bearers (1.0%).
Popularity
Wilson: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Wilson from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1910s, with 6,859 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1910s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Wilson 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 Wilson during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Wilsons live
The SSA's state-level files cover 49 states and territories. New York, California, Texas recorded the most babies named Wilson, while North Dakota, Vermont, Nevada recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 851 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Wilson
The name Wilson is an English given name derived from the surname Wilson, which is itself derived from the Old English words "will" and "sun", meaning "son of Will" or "son of William". The name originated in England during the Middle Ages, likely as a way to identify the son of a person named William or Will.
In terms of historical references, the name Wilson is not found in ancient texts or religious scriptures. However, it does appear in various historical records and documents from the medieval period onwards, particularly in England and other English-speaking regions.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Wilson as a given name dates back to the late 16th century. A notable figure from this time period is Wilson Raleigh, an English author and poet who lived from around 1551 to 1622.
In the 17th century, the name Wilson gained some prominence with individuals like Wilson Cary (1594-1677), an English politician and member of Parliament during the English Civil War. Another notable figure from this era is Wilson Higginson (1631-1670), an English theologian and author.
The 18th century saw the rise of several prominent individuals with the name Wilson, including Wilson Ritchie (1713-1783), a Scottish philosopher and academic, and Wilson Hogarth (1697-1764), an English painter and engraver known for his satirical works.
In the 19th century, the name Wilson continued to be used, with individuals such as Wilson Peel (1823-1891), a British politician and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and Wilson Stevenson (1838-1905), a Scottish-American inventor and engineer who helped develop the modern lighthouse lens system.
Other notable figures with the name Wilson include Wilson Pickett (1941-2006), an American singer and songwriter known as a pioneer of soul music, and Wilson Keppel (1925-1994), a British actor and comedian who appeared in numerous films and television shows.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Wilson
People
Wilson + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Wilson 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
Wilson: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Wilson?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 28,231 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Wilson 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 12,141 US residents.
Is Wilson a common name?
We classify Wilson as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 48,613 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Wilson most popular?
The single biggest year for Wilson was 1918, when 1,381 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Wilson is about 40 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Wilson in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 39,892 people with the name Wilson, or 13.21 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,052 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 Wilson 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 Wilson?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Wilson leans strongly male. 39,489 people counted with this name were male (99.0%), compared with 406 female bearers (1.0%). 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 Wilson?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Wilson is Hispanic at 39.7%. The next largest groups are White (32.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (13.5%). 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 Wilson most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Wilson in the 2020 Census, accounting for 39.7% (15,826 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 Wilson in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Wilson a male name?
Yes, 99.6% of people registered as Wilson 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 Wilson still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Wilson 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 Wilson 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 Wilson?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.