Alston

28,708 people in the United States were counted with the surname Alston in the 2020 census, making it the 1,203rd most common in the country. That is about one person in 10,400.

By the numbers

People: 28,708
Rank: 1,203rd
How common: 1 in 10,400
Per 100,000: 9.6

Where the name comes from

Origin Old English

From Old English Ælfes (given name with possessive) tun, translating as "Ælf's town".

Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Who bears the name

How people with the surname Alston described their own race and Hispanic origin at the 2020 census:

Black, not Hispanic 77.0%
White, not Hispanic 13.7%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 5.2%
Hispanic or Latino 3.5%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 0.4%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.3%

Notable people called Alston

William Alston (1921–2009)American Christian philosopher
Rafer Alston (born 1976)American basketball player
Adrian Alston (born 1949)Australian soccer player
Derrick Alston (born 1972)American basketball player
Charles Alston (1907–1977)African-American visual artist
Charles Alston (1685–1760)Scottish botanist and physician (1683/5 – 1760)

People named Alston with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).

Surnames like Alston

Alsup

Also a first name

Alston has been given to 2,600 American babies as a first name since 1894, peaking in 2017. See it as a given name.

Try it on yourself

Source: US Census Bureau, Frequently Occurring Surnames, 2020. The Census describes the file as the surnames borne by 100 or more people; rarer names are not published. The line is not quite exact, and 617 published names come in under it, the smallest at 92 people. Race and Hispanic origin are self-reported. Rates are worked out against the 298.9 million people the file's own figures are calculated on, which is fewer than the census counted in all: the difference is everyone whose surname was too rare to publish.