Ynez
A feminine name of Spanish origin meaning "Stay chaste".
Name Census estimates that about 169 living Americans carry the first name Ynez. It is a predominantly female name (97.7% of registrations). The average person named Ynez today is around 17 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ynez births was 2024 (15 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ynez. 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 Ynez with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
169
~ 1 in 2,028,132 Americans
Peak year
2024
15 babies that year
Average age
17
years old
1930 SSA rank
#4,538
Tracked since 1907
Census
Ynez in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 274 people with the first name Ynez, which placed it at #31,306 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
#31,306
National first-name rank
People counted
274
274 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
73.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ynez
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ynez is Hispanic at 73.7%. The next largest groups are White (9.1%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (8.8%). 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 Ynez 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 Ynez at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino73.7% · 202
- White9.1% · 25
- Asian and Pacific Islander8.8% · 24
- Black or African American4.7% · 13
- Two or more races3.6% · 10
Gender
Gender distribution for Ynez
Ynez leans heavily female at 97.7% of total registrations, but 5 boys have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Ynez as a male name
- Ranked #4,538 in 1930
- 5 male births in 1930
- Peak: 1930 (5 births)
Ynez as a female name
- Ranked #7,552 in 2024
- 15 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (15 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ynez leans strongly female. 241 people counted with this name were female (86.4%), compared with 38 male bearers (13.6%).
Popularity
Ynez: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ynez from the 1900s through to the 2020s, spanning 10 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 54 total registrations. The name continues to be given at rates close to its all-time high, suggesting it has not yet fallen out of fashion.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ynez 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 Ynez during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ynez' live
Origin
Meaning and history of Ynez
The name Ynez is derived from the Spanish Inés, which in turn originates from the Latin Agnes, meaning "chaste" or "pure". It is a feminine given name that was particularly popular in medieval Spain and has been in use since the early centuries of the Christian era.
The earliest known record of the name Agnes dates back to ancient Rome, where it was borne by a young virgin martyr who suffered death for her Christian faith during the reign of the Roman emperor Diocletian in the early 4th century. Her story and veneration as a saint helped popularize the name throughout Europe.
In Spain, the name Inés became widely used during the Middle Ages, with one of the earliest known bearers being Inés de Navarra (1035–1076), an Iberian princess who was the daughter of King García Sánchez III of Navarre and his wife Estefanía de Barcelona.
Another notable figure was Inés de Castro (c. 1325–1355), a Galician noblewoman whose tragic love story with Pedro, the heir to the Portuguese throne, became a legendary tale of forbidden love and ultimately resulted in her murder by the king's order.
The Spanish variant Ynez, with its distinctive spelling, emerged in the late medieval period and has been used alongside Inés. One of the earliest known bearers of this spelling was Ynez de Zúñiga (c. 1480–1565), a Spanish noblewoman and courtier during the reign of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.
In the 16th century, Ynez de Quirós (c. 1508–1585) was a Spanish conquistadora who accompanied her husband, Pedro Fernández de Quirós, on his expeditions to the Pacific and is credited with being one of the first European women to set foot in the Solomon Islands.
Another notable figure was Ynez de Lewin (1616–1663), a Polish-born Spanish writer and translator who is considered one of the earliest female authors of the Spanish Golden Age.
People
Ynez + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ynez as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with Y
Other first names starting with Y with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Ynez: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ynez?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 169 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ynez 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 2,028,132 US residents.
Is Ynez a common name?
We classify Ynez as "Very Rare". It ranks above 72% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 215 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ynez most popular?
The single biggest year for Ynez was 2024, when 15 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ynez is about 17 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ynez in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 274 people with the name Ynez, or 0.09 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #31,306 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 Ynez 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 Ynez?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ynez leans strongly female. 241 people counted with this name were female (86.4%), compared with 38 male bearers (13.6%). 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 Ynez?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ynez is Hispanic at 73.7%. The next largest groups are White (9.1%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (8.8%). 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 Ynez most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Ynez in the 2020 Census, accounting for 73.7% (202 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 Ynez in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ynez a female name?
Yes, 97.7% of people registered as Ynez 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 Ynez still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ynez 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 Ynez 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 Ynez?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.