Prior

At the 2020 census, 6,508 Americans bore the surname Prior — 5,186th out of 156,621 surnames on file. That is about one person in 45,900.

By the numbers

People: 6,508
Rank: 5,186th
How common: 1 in 45,900
Per 100,000: 2.2

Where the name comes from

Origin an occupational name

From Middle English Prior, Priur, from Middle English prior, priour (“prior”). More at prior.

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 84.7%
Black, not Hispanic 5.6%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 4.3%
Hispanic or Latino 4.0%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 1.0%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.5%

Notable people called Prior

Matthew Prior (1664–1721)British diplomat, poet
Maddy Prior (born 1947)British folk singer, musician
William Wain Prior (1876–1946)Danish general
Herbert Prior (1867–1954)English Actor
James Prior, Baron Prior (1927–2016)British politician

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

Surnames like Prior

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.