Explore the Family Name Nikolai

The meaning of Nikolai

North German: patronymic from the Latin genitive case of the personal name Nikolaus ‘Nicholas’. Some characteristic forenames: German Erhard, Hans, Kurt, Willi, Wolfram.

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

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

Based on the Decennial U.S. Census data, the surname "Nikolai" has seen a surge in popularity from 2000 to 2010. In 2000, it was ranked 41,859 in terms of popularity, but by 2010 that rank improved to 32,710. This represents a significant increase of 21.86%. The number of people carrying the Nikolai surname also increased during this period, from 489 in 2000 to 702 in 2010, which is an impressive growth of 43.56%. The proportion of people named Nikolai per every 100,000 individuals also rose by 33.33%, from 0.18 to 0.24.

	2000	2010	Change
Rank	#41,859	#32,710	21.86%
Count	489	702	43.56%
Proportion per 100k	0.18	0.24	33.33%

Race and Ethnicity of people with the last name Nikolai

The ethnic identity associated with the surname Nikolai has experienced some changes from 2000 to 2010 according to the Decennial U.S. Census data. While White remains the dominant ethnicity linked to Nikolai, its percentage decreased slightly from 95.30% to 91.31%. Meanwhile, the percentage of those identifying as Two or More Races saw a mild increase from 1.43% to 1.71%. Most notably, the American Indian and Alaskan Native group saw a major rise, their association with the surname Nikolai growing from 3.07% to 4.99%. For the first time in 2010, the name Nikolai was also associated with Hispanic ethnicity at 1.57%. No association was found between Nikolai and either the Asian/Pacific Islander or Black ethnic identities during these years.

	2000	2010	Change
White	95.3%	91.31%	-4.19%
American Indian and Alaskan Native	3.07%	4.99%	62.54%
Two or More Races	1.43%	1.71%	19.58%
Hispanic	0%	1.57%	0%
Asian/Pacific Islander	0%	0%	0%
Black	0%	0%	0%