Liu

Liu is the 232nd most common surname in the United States, shared by 127,257 people at the 2020 census. That is about one person in 2,349.

By the numbers

People: 127,257
Rank: 232nd
How common: 1 in 2,349
Per 100,000: 42.6

Where the name comes from

Origin Chinese

From several surnames, including:.

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

Who bears the name

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

Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 95.3%
White, not Hispanic 2.3%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 1.4%
Hispanic or Latino 0.6%
Black, not Hispanic 0.4%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.02%

Notable people called Liu

Liu Xiaobo (1955–2017)Chinese literary critic, writer, professor, and human rights activist
Lucy Liu (born 1968)American actress
Liu Yifei (born 1987)Chinese-American actress and singer
Liu Shaoqi (1898–1969)2nd President of the People's Republic of China
Liu Yang (born 1978)Chinese astronaut
Liu Gang (born 1961)Chinese scientist and revolutionary
Liu Cixin (born 1963)Chinese science fiction writer
Alysa Liu (born 2005)American figure skater

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

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.