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    The surname Gates

    A place surname, carried by 52,569 people in the United States.

    Pronounced /ɡeɪts/ 1 syllable Soundex G320

    Gates: #648 of 162,253 surnames in the 2010 US Census #1Smith#160,975Doriott#10Martinez#100Jimenez#10,001Dubon Gates #648, 52,569 people Gates: #648 of 162,253 surnames in the 2010 US Census #1Smith#160,975Doriott Gates #648, 52,569 people
    Every surname held by 100 or more people in the 2010 US Census, most common on the left (162,253 in all). Gates is more common than 99.6% of them.

    Origin

    From gate. A topographic name for someone who lived by the gates of a medieval walled town.

    Gates is a place surname: taken from where an ancestor lived or came from.

    Origin from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0).

    How common it is

    2010 US Census

    There were 52,569 people named Gates in the United States in 2010, about 1 in every 5,873 Americans. That is up 3.6% since 2000, when the Census counted 50,748.

    #648
    rank among US surnames
    52,569
    people in 2010
    18
    per 100,000 Americans
    +3.6%
    change since 2000 (was #607)
    RankSurnamePeople1 in
    #639Meza53,2305,800
    #640Roy53,1595,808
    #641Vincent53,0955,815
    #642York53,0595,819
    #643Hodge52,9205,834
    #644Villa52,8175,846
    #645Abbott52,7395,854

    Who is named Gates

    Race and Hispanic origin as people reported it in the 2010 Census

    75% of people named Gates identified as white (not Hispanic), 19% as Black (not Hispanic) and 2.4% as Hispanic or Latino (any race).

    • White (not Hispanic) 75%
    • Black (not Hispanic) 19%
    • Hispanic or Latino (any race) 2.4%
    • Two or more races 2.1%
    • American Indian and Alaska Native 0.8%
    • Asian and Pacific Islander 0.6%

    Compare: most common surnames among white Americans.

    Famous Gatess

    19 notable people on Wikidata, most written-about first

    • Bill Gates
      American businessman, investor, and philanthropist (born 1955)
    • Melinda Gates
      American philanthropist, born 1964
    • Synyster Gates
      American guitarist, born 1981
    • Horatio Gates
      American general in the American Revolutionary War (1727–1806)
    • Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
      American literary critic, professor and historian (born 1950)
    • Bill Gates Sr.
      American attorney and philanthropist (1925–2020)
    • David Gates
      American musician, born 1940
    • Nancy Gates
      American actress (1926-2019)
    • Thomas S. Gates, Jr.
      American diplomat (1906-1983)
    • Sylvester James Gates
      American physicist, born 1950
    • Greg Gates
      American rower (1926–2020)
    • Larry Gates
      American actor (1915–1996)

    Notable Gatess come mostly from the United States (18) and the Kingdom of Great Britain (1).

    Spellings and sound-alikes

    Useful when a record has your ancestor under another spelling

    Surnames that sound like Gates

    Gates has the Soundex code G320, the code US census indexes have used since the 1930s. Every surname with code G320.

    Questions

    Where does the surname Gates come from?
    From gate. A topographic name for someone who lived by the gates of a medieval walled town.
    How common is the surname Gates?
    52,569 people in the United States had the surname Gates in the 2010 Census, about 1 in every 5,873 Americans. It ranked 648th of 162,253 surnames.
    What ethnicity is the surname Gates?
    In the 2010 Census, 75% of people named Gates identified as white (not Hispanic), and 19% as Black (not Hispanic).
    Who is the most famous person named Gates?
    Bill Gates, American businessman, investor, and philanthropist (born 1955), followed by Melinda Gates.
    Where is the surname Gates most common?
    Wikidata records people named Gates in the United States and the Kingdom of Great Britain.
    How do you pronounce Gates?
    Gates is /ɡeɪts/, one syllable.
    What type of surname is Gates?
    Gates is a place surname, taken from where an ancestor lived or came from.
    Is the surname Gates getting more or less common?
    More common. 50,748 people carried it in the 2000 Census and 52,569 in 2010, up 3.6%.