Law

Law is the 1,072nd most common surname in the United States, shared by 32,116 people at the 2020 census. That is about one person in 9,307.

By the numbers

People: 32,116
Rank: 1,072nd
How common: 1 in 9,307
Per 100,000: 10.7

Where the name comes from

Origin a patronymic

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 62.5%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 15.4%
Black, not Hispanic 14.7%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 4.0%
Hispanic or Latino 3.0%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.4%

Notable people called Law

Jude Law (born 1972)English actor
Bonar Law (1858–1923)Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1922 to 1923
Denis Law (1940–2025)Scottish footballer
John Law (1671–1729)Scottish economist and banker
Bernard Francis Law (1931–2017)Catholic cardinal
Nathan Law (born 1993)Hong Kong politician
Katrina Law (born 1985)American actress
Edward Law, 1st Earl of Ellenborough (1790–1871)British Tory politician, Governor-General of India

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

Surnames like Law

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.