Murphy

At the 2020 census, 298,047 Americans bore the surname Murphy — 65th out of 156,621 surnames on file. That is about one person in 1,003.

By the numbers

People: 298,047
Rank: 65th
How common: 1 in 1,003
Per 100,000: 99.7

Where the name comes from

Origin Irish

From Irish Ó Murchadha (“descendant of Murrough”), Mac Murchaidh (“Son of Murrough”), etc. See Muircath.

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 80.5%
Black, not Hispanic 11.2%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 3.6%
Hispanic or Latino 3.5%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 0.7%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.6%

Notable people called Murphy

Eddie Murphy (born 1961)American actor and comedian
Cillian Murphy (born 1976)Irish actor
Brittany Murphy (1977–2009)American actress and singer
William P. Murphy (1892–1987)American scientist
Audie Murphy (1925–1971)American soldier and actor
Ryan Murphy (born 1965)American screenwriter
Róisín Murphy (born 1973)Irish singer-songwriter
Shaun Murphy (born 1982)English snooker player

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

Surnames like Murphy

Also a first name

Murphy has been given to 13,174 American babies as a first name since 1881, peaking in 2025. 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.