Joy

13,910 people in the United States were counted with the surname Joy in the 2020 census, making it the 2,532nd most common in the country. That is about one person in 21,500.

By the numbers

People: 13,910
Rank: 2,532nd
How common: 1 in 21,500
Per 100,000: 4.7

Where the name comes from

From the noun joy, first used by Puritans in the 17th century.

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 72.9%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 10.9%
Black, not Hispanic 8.4%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 3.7%
Hispanic or Latino 3.6%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.5%

Notable people called Joy

Anya Taylor-Joy (born 1996)actress
Bill Joy (born 1954)American computer scientist
Joy (born 1996)South Korean singer and actress, born 1996
Leatrice Joy (1893–1985)American actress
Melanie Joy (born 1966)American psychologist
Vance Joy (born 1987)Australian singer-songwriter
Robert Joy (born 1951)Canadian actor
Lisa Joy (born 1972)American screenwriter and executive producer

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

Surnames like Joy

Also a first name

Joy has been given to 143,324 American babies as a first name since 1883, peaking in 1957. 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.