Watkins

At the 2020 census, 122,315 Americans bore the surname Watkins — 251st out of 156,621 surnames on file. That is about one person in 2,444.

By the numbers

People: 122,315
Rank: 251st
How common: 1 in 2,444
Per 100,000: 40.9

Where the name comes from

Origin a given name

From a medieval diminutive of the given name Walter + the patronymic suffix -s.

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

Who bears the name

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

White, not Hispanic 59.6%
Black, not Hispanic 31.2%
Two or more races, not Hispanic 4.9%
Hispanic or Latino 3.2%
American Indian or Alaska Native, not Hispanic 0.6%
Asian or Pacific Islander, not Hispanic 0.5%

Notable people called Watkins

Ollie Watkins (born 1995)English footballer
Jessica Watkins (born 1988)US astronaut
Ian Watkins (1977–2025)Welsh musician and sex offender
Sid Watkins (1928–2012)English neurosurgeon and Formula One doctor
Tuc Watkins (born 1966)American actor
Tionne Watkins (born 1970)American singer
Anna Watkins (born 1983)British rower
James Watkins (born 1973)British writer and film director

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

Surnames like Watkins

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.