Isaac

242,217 people in America carry this name — ranked #231 of 923.

Most Americans carrying it were born this century.

Say it Y zuhk

2 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part

Phonetic transcription

AY1 Z AH0 K — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.

  • People counted 242,217 2020 Census
  • Rank #231 Common

The meaning and origin of Isaac

Hebrew in origin, reading literally as “laughter”.

Origins are a matter of scholarly argument rather than record, and a name can be traced more than one way. We state one reading and say where it came from.

Isaac through the years

299,071 babies were given this name since 1880. The busiest year was 2007, with 10,277 of them.

80 90 00 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 00 10s 20

Most people carrying it were born in the 2010s.

Counted from Social Security card applications, so it covers births registered in the United States and leaves out names given to fewer than five babies in a year.

What goes well after Isaac

Two syllables sit with almost anything — the join matters more than the length.

Better avoided

  • Isaac Christopher — runs together
  • Isaac Charles — runs together
  • Isaac Kevin — runs together

Chosen by sound from the pronouncing dictionary, then ordered by how often the name is given. None of it is a rule — the ear decides.

On the way up

Isaac is given more often now than it was a generation ago. Most names move the other way.

Is Isaac a boy's or a girl's name?

99.8% men
471 women

As recorded on census returns, not as anyone thinks the name ought to be used.

Names built the same way as Isaac

Nothing else in the file ends on the same sound — a rare thing, and useful if you want a first name nobody will echo.

Same rhythm — 2 syllables, stress on the first

Matched on phonemes, not spelling, so the lists follow the ear rather than the page.

Where in America Isaac is thickest on the ground

In New Mexico the name is given 2.1 times as often as it is across the country.

  • New Mexico ×2.1
  • Utah ×1.8
  • Nevada ×1.6
  • Idaho ×1.6
  • Alaska ×1.6

Measured against the state's own share of births since 1960, so a small state can lead a big one. Counted from Social Security card applications.

The likeliest full names

The census counts first names and surnames separately and never together, so these are estimates: how often the two halves would meet if they paired at random. They do not — names cluster by community — so read them as an order of magnitude, not a headcount.

Who answers to it now

  • White alone (non-Hispanic) — 44.7%
  • Black or African American alone (non-Hispanic) — 9.8%
  • Hispanic or Latino origin — 36.6%
  • Two or more races — 4.8%
  • Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone — 3.4%
  • American Indian and Alaska Native alone — 0.7%

Categories are how people answered the census — a fact about the bearers, not a property of the name. Conclusions are ours, not the Census Bureau’s.

Try it Full-Name Estimator

Add a surname and see how many Americans carry the two together.

Open Full-Name Estimator on its own page

Where this page gets its numbers

  • Counts, ranks and shares: U.S. Census Bureau, 2020 Census tabulations of first and last names occurring 100 or more times. Percentages, bands and groupings are our own arithmetic — the conclusions are ours, not the Bureau’s.
  • Pronunciation, syllables and rhyme groups: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, Carnegie Mellon University. The plain-English respelling is ours.
  • Origins and the forms a name takes in other languages: Charlotte Yonge, History of Christian Names, 1884 — a public-domain work. Scholarship has moved on since, so read it as one reading of a name, not the last word.

Below a hundred people we publish no figure at all — the same threshold the Census Bureau applies to us. What each source covers
Other names of Hebrew origin