Read

At the 2020 census, 16,452 Americans bore the surname Read — 2,150th out of 156,621 surnames on file. That is about one person in 18,200.

By the numbers

People: 16,452
Rank: 2,150th
How common: 1 in 18,200
Per 100,000: 5.5

Where the name comes from

Origin Old English

English and Scottish surname, variant of Reed.

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 87.5%
Hispanic or Latino 5.6%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 3.2%
Black, not Hispanic 2.7%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 0.7%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.3%

Notable people called Read

Mary Read (2005–1721)English pirate
Herbert Edward Read (1893–1968)English anarchist, poet, and critic of literature and art
Norman Read (1931–1994)New Zealand racewalker
George Read (1733–1798)American politician
Phil Read (1939–2022)British motorcycle racer
James Read (born 1953)American actor
Kieran Read (born 1985)New Zealand rugby union player
Leonard Read (1898–1983)American academic

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

Surnames like Read

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.