Lincoln

Lincoln is the 2,230th most common surname in the United States, shared by 15,912 people at the 2020 census. That is about one person in 18,800.

By the numbers

People: 15,912
Rank: 2,230th
How common: 1 in 18,800
Per 100,000: 5.3

Where the name comes from

Origin Old English

from Old English Lincolle, Lindcolen, Lindcylene, from Latin Lindum Colōnia (“the Roman settlement Lindum Colonia”), from cel-bry-pro *llɨnn (“pool”), from Proto-Celtic *lindos (“lake, liquid”), in reference to the Brayford. In the United States, many of the places established since 1865 are named after Abraham Lincoln.

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 71.8%
Black, not Hispanic 13.4%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 5.3%
Hispanic or Latino 4.1%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 3.6%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 1.8%

Notable people called Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865)president of the United States from 1861 to 1865
Mary Todd Lincoln (1818–1882)First Lady of the United States from 1861 to 1865
Andrew Lincoln (born 1973)British actor
Abbey Lincoln (1930–2010)American singer
Robert Todd Lincoln (1843–1926)Union Army officer, U.S. ambassador, and Secretary of War
Blanche Lincoln (born 1960)American politician
Lincoln (born 1979)Brazilian footballer
Elmo Lincoln (1889–1952)American film actor

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

Surnames like Lincoln

Also a first name

Lincoln has been given to 106,968 American babies as a first name since 1880, 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.