Richard
1,575,998 people in America carry this name — ranked #11 of 923.
A name with a settled sense and a settled sound.
Say it RIH churd
2 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part
Phonetic transcription
R IH1 CH ER0 D — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.
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People counted 1,575,998 2020 Census
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As a surname 51,000 ranked #650 the other way round
Where Richard comes from and what it means
Teutonic in origin, reading literally as “stern king”.
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.
Richard name popularity by year
2,578,808 babies were given this name since 1880. The busiest year was 1946, with 58,995 of them.
Most people carrying it were born in the 1950s. It has been given less often of late.
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.
Middle names for Richard
Two syllables sit with almost anything — the join matters more than the length.
- Richard Michael
- Richard John
- Richard James
- Richard William
- Richard Joseph
- Richard Thomas
- Richard Christopher
- Richard Matthew
Better avoided
- Richard David — runs together
- Richard Robert — same opening
- Richard Daniel — 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.
A name from before the war
The year most children were called Richard was 1946. Names of that age tend to come back once their owners are grandparents.
Is Richard used for boys or for girls?
As recorded on census returns, not as anyone thinks the name ought to be used.
How to spell Richard
Richard is how 89% of them spell it — 1,765,957 people answer to the sound.
- Richard 89%
- Ricardo 11%
Each spelling is its own census entry — the counts never overlap, so the shares are of the group, not of the country.
Names about as common
- Maria 1,652,966
- Daniel 1,607,193
- Joseph 1,600,667
- Thomas 1,506,606
- Christopher 1,499,872
- Jennifer 1,331,077
The nearest entries above and below by number of people.
This name in other languages
- Rykert Dutch
- Ryszard Polish
- Ricardo Portuguese
- Riccardo Italian
- Ricciardo Italian
- Ricciardetto Italian
Forms of one name traced to the same root. Spellings are as the glossary printed them, so some look older than the versions in use today.
Where in America Richard is thickest on the ground
In Rhode Island the name is given 1.8 times as often as it is across the country.
- Rhode Island ×1.8
- Delaware ×1.5
- Massachusetts ×1.5
- Maine ×1.5
- Connecticut ×1.5
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 most common full names
- Richard Johnson ≈ 8,800 people
- Richard Jones ≈ 6,600 people
- Richard Garcia ≈ 5,500 people
- Richard Miller ≈ 5,400 people
- Richard Davis ≈ 5,100 people
- Richard Wilson ≈ 3,700 people
- Richard Anderson ≈ 3,600 people
- Richard Thomas ≈ 3,500 people
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 has this name today
- White alone (non-Hispanic) — 82.3%
- Black or African American alone (non-Hispanic) — 5.2%
- Hispanic or Latino origin — 8.0%
- Two or more races — 2.1%
- Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone — 1.9%
- American Indian and Alaska Native alone — 0.6%
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.
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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 Teutonic origin