Explore the Family Name Canary

The meaning of Canary

1. Altered form of Irish Connery. 2. Americanized form of Polish and Jewish (from Poland) Kanarek ‘canary’. Compare Kanary.

Dictionary of American Family Names, 2nd edition, © Oxford University Press, 2022.

How common is the last name Canary in the United States?

The surname Canary was ranked 22,783 in popularity in the year 2000, according to the Decennial U.S. Census data. However, by 2010, it had slipped slightly to 24,288, reflecting a decrease of 6.61%. The total count of individuals carrying the Canary surname also witnessed a slight dip from 1,051 in 2000 to 1,033 in 2010, which is a decline of 1.71%. This indicates that the proportion of individuals with the Canary surname per 100,000 people also fell from 0.39 to 0.35 during this decade, marking a 10.26% drop.

	2000	2010	Change
Rank	#22,783	#24,288	-6.61%
Count	1,051	1,033	-1.71%
Proportion per 100k	0.39	0.35	-10.26%

Race and Ethnicity of people with the last name Canary

In terms of ethnicity, the Decennial U.S. Census data shows that most individuals with the Canary surname reported their ethnic identity as White in both 2000 and 2010, although there was a marginal reduction of 1.60% over the decade. Interestingly, individuals identifying as two or more races saw a significant increase, rising by 120.83% between 2000 and 2010. There was also an increase in those identifying as Hispanic, with a notable jump of 90.79%. During the same period, individuals reporting their ethnicity as Black saw a modest increase of 1.75%, while Asian/Pacific Islander and American Indian and Alaskan Native categories registered no percentage changes in 2010, potentially due to suppressed data for privacy reasons.

	2000	2010	Change
White	95.43%	93.9%	-1.6%
Black	2.28%	2.32%	1.75%
Hispanic	0.76%	1.45%	90.79%
Two or More Races	0.48%	1.06%	120.83%
Asian/Pacific Islander	0.48%	0%	0%
American Indian and Alaskan Native	0.57%	0%	0%