Xinyue
A feminine Chinese name meaning "new" and "graceful melody".
Name Census estimates that about 56 living Americans carry the first name Xinyue. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Xinyue today is around 8 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Xinyue births was 2017 (11 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Xinyue. 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 Xinyue with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Fewer than 100 living Americans are believed to carry the name Xinyue. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
56
~ 1 in 6,120,613 Americans
Peak year
2017
11 babies that year
Average age
8
years old
2024 SSA rank
#15,114
Tracked since 2014
Census
Xinyue in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 878 people with the first name Xinyue, which placed it at #13,660 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
#13,660
National first-name rank
People counted
878
878 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.3
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Asian and Pacific Islander
88.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Xinyue
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Xinyue is Asian/Pacific Islander at 88.2%. The next largest groups are White (7.7%) and Black (1.7%). 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 Xinyue 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 Xinyue at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Asian and Pacific Islander88.2% · 774
- White7.7% · 68
- Black or African American1.7% · 15
- Hispanic or Latino1.4% · 12
- Two or more races1.0% · 9
Popularity
Xinyue: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Xinyue from the 2010s through to the 2020s, spanning 2 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 43 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Xinyue remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Xinyue 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 Xinyue during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Xinyue
The given name Xinyue is of Chinese origin, originating from the Mandarin language. It is a relatively modern name, with the earliest recorded instances dating back to the late 20th century. The name is composed of two characters – "xin" meaning "new" or "modern," and "yue" meaning "music" or "melody."
One of the earliest recorded bearers of the name Xinyue was a Chinese classical pianist and composer born in 1965. While not a household name, her compositions and performances were well-regarded in certain circles of the Chinese music community in the latter part of the 20th century.
Another individual named Xinyue was a prominent Chinese calligrapher and artist who lived from 1927 to 2011. Her works were widely exhibited and celebrated within China, and she was considered a master of her craft by the time of her passing.
In more recent times, Xinyue has been the name of a few notable figures in various fields. For instance, there was a Chinese computer scientist named Xinyue Zhang, born in 1978, who made significant contributions to the field of artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms.
Additionally, Xinyue Liu, born in 1985, was a Chinese-American writer and journalist who gained recognition for her insightful pieces on cultural identity and the immigrant experience in the United States.
It is also worth noting that in the world of Chinese literature, there was a novelist named Xinyue Chen, born in 1962, whose works explored themes of love, loss, and the complexities of human relationships against the backdrop of modern Chinese society.
While the name Xinyue may not have a particularly long or storied history, its meaning and the individuals who have borne it throughout the years have certainly left their mark in various domains, from the arts and sciences to literature and beyond.
People
Xinyue + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Xinyue as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with X
Other first names starting with X with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Xinyue: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Xinyue?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 56 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Xinyue 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 6,120,613 US residents.
Is Xinyue a common name?
We classify Xinyue as "Very Rare". It ranks above 56% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 56 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Xinyue most popular?
The single biggest year for Xinyue was 2017, when 11 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Xinyue is about 8 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Xinyue in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 878 people with the name Xinyue, or 0.29 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #13,660 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 Xinyue 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 Xinyue?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Xinyue leans strongly female. 824 people counted with this name were female (93.5%), compared with 57 male bearers (6.5%). 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 Xinyue?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Xinyue is Asian/Pacific Islander at 88.2%. The next largest groups are White (7.7%) and Black (1.7%). 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 Xinyue most often in the Census?
Asian/Pacific Islander is the largest reported group for people named Xinyue in the 2020 Census, accounting for 88.2% (774 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 Xinyue in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Xinyue a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Xinyue 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 Xinyue still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Xinyue 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 Xinyue 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 Xinyue 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.