# Vail (surname)

Source: https://namelineage.com/surname/vail/  
Publisher: Name Lineage. Counts from the US Census Bureau; origin and etymology from Wiktionary; bearers from Wikidata. Data updated 2026-11-11.

A surname.

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Origin | not recorded |
| Type | not recorded |
| People in the US (2010 Census) | 10,554 |
| US rank (2010) | 3,385 of 162,253 |
| How often | about 1 in every 29,254 people |
| Change since 2000 | +5.1% (10,042 in 2000) |
| Pronunciation | /veɪl/, 1 syllable |
| Variant spellings | none recorded |

## Etymology

The town in Colorado was named after Vail Pass, which in turn was named after highway engineer Charles Vail. The surname likely comes from the obsolete term vail, meaning "submission", of Anglo-Norman origin.

## Who carries it

Share of people named Vail in the 2010 US Census by the Census's own race and ethnicity groups. The Census suppresses a share when the count behind it is small.

| Group | Share |
|---|---|
| White (not Hispanic) | 86% |
| Black (not Hispanic) | 4.9% |
| Hispanic or Latino (any race) | 5.2% |
| Asian and Pacific Islander | 1.0% |
| American Indian and Alaska Native | 0.4% |
| Two or more races | 2.0% |

## Where

Wikidata records people named Vail in the United States.

## People named Vail

- Alfred Vail, American inventor (1807–1859)
- Anna Murray Vail, American botanist, botanical collector, librarian and editor (1863-1955)
- Tobi Vail, American musician

## Similar surnames

Valle, Veal, Vale, Vila, Vallo, Valla, Villa, Vela, Viola, Valley, Vella, Vallee.

## How to read these numbers

A Census count is people alive and counted in 2010, not births, and names occurring fewer than 100 times are not published at all. Ethnicity shares are the Census's own categories.