Shepherd
59,896 people in the United States were counted with the surname Shepherd in the 2020 census, making it the 552nd most common in the country. That is about one person in 4,990.
By the numbers
- People
- 59,896
- Rank
- 552nd
- How common
- 1 in 4,990
- Per 100,000
- 20.0
Where the name comes from
Origin an occupational name
Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Who bears the name
How people with the surname Shepherd described their own race and Hispanic origin at the 2020 census:
Notable people called Shepherd
- Cybill Shepherd (born 1950)American actress
- William Shepherd (born 1949)American astronaut
- Sherri Shepherd (born 1967)American actress, comedian, author and television personality
- Ben Shepherd (born 1968)American musician
- Mircea the Shepherd (died 1559)Voivode of Wallachia
- Kenny Wayne Shepherd (born 1977)American guitarist
- John James Shepherd (1884–1954)English tug of war competitor
- Dennis Shepherd (1926–2006)boxer
People named Shepherd with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).
Surnames like Shepherd
Also a first name
Shepherd has been given to 7,815 American babies as a first name since 1886, 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.