Paul

80,097 people in the United States were counted with the surname Paul in the 2020 census, making it the 396th most common in the country. That is about one person in 3,732.

By the numbers

People: 80,097
Rank: 396th
How common: 1 in 3,732
Per 100,000: 26.8

Where the name comes from

Origin a patronymic

from paulus (“small”).

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 60.6%
Black, not Hispanic 21.7%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 9.0%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 3.6%
Hispanic or Latino 3.5%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 1.8%

Notable people called Paul

Ron Paul (born 1935)American politician
Jean Paul (1763–1825)German Romantic writer
Wolfgang Paul (1913–1993)German physicist
Vincent de Paul (1581–1660)French priest, founder and saint
Les Paul (1915–2009)American jazz guitarist, country guitarist, songwriter and inventor
Aaron Paul (born 1979)American actor
Rand Paul (born 1963)United States Senator from Kentucky since 2011
Chris Paul (born 1985)American basketball player

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

Surnames like Paul

Also a first name

Paul has been given to 1,404,135 American babies as a first name since 1880, 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.