Vasco
Masculine · “a Basque”
Vasco means Basque. The Spanish and Portuguese word for the Basque people became a personal name in the medieval Iberian kingdoms, and it belongs to the navigator who found the sea route to India. Its American peak is 1910, with Portuguese and Italian migration.
How old is the name Vasco?
Vasco first appears in US birth records in 1910 — 115 years ago. The typical Vasco alive today was born around 1944, making them about 81 years old. About 300 people named Vasco are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Vasco most popular?
Vasco peaked in 1910, reaching #1314 nationally. Today it ranks #6143, 4,829 places below that high. See the whole 1910 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Vascones to Vasco
The story of Vasco
The Vascones appear in Roman sources as a people of the upper Ebro, and their name survived into Spanish as vasco and into French as Gascon — the same word producing two different peoples' names by different sound changes. Vasco became a given name in medieval Castile and Portugal. Vasco da Gama, who sailed round the Cape of Good Hope to Calicut in 1498, opened the sea route from Europe to India and became one of the central figures of Portuguese national memory; Camoes made him the hero of the Lusiads. American records show the name with Portuguese and Cape Verdean communities in New England and California.
Meaning
a Basque
Spanish and Portuguese vasco means Basque, from Latin Vasco, the Roman name for the Vascones, a people of the western Pyrenees whose descendants are the Basques. The same root gives Gascon and Gascony, by a regular Latin-to-French sound change. As a personal name it identified someone from that region. Velasco and Vazquez descend from the same source, and the derivation is settled.
How the name formed
- Vascones
- vasco
- Vasco
Related forms: Vasco · Velasco · Vasco
Pronouncing Vasco
VAHS-koh
Two syllables, stress on the first, with a clean s. Portuguese, Spanish and Italian all say it the same way. English speakers reach it correctly on sight.
Nicknames for Vasco
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1910
- Most boys named
- 191618 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1314reached in 1910
- Change vs 2024
- −12.5%14 in 2025, from 16
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Vasco in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Vasco in Portuguese — same name
- Velasco in Spanish — related form
- Vasco in Italian — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: Florida.
Vascos among us
people named Vasco are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 122,005 born in 2025 was named Vasco
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
Fashion outlook
Vasco sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Vasco beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Vasco in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is a single word naming a real and ancient people.
- It is short, distinctive and phonetic in four languages.
- It has one of the most famous navigators in history behind it.
- It is rare in the United States and will be spelled out routinely.
- It is close to Vance, Basco and Wasco in English ears.
- Its American curve is early-twentieth-century, which places a bearer's generation.
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Vasco
Masculine · #6143 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Vascos are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 300 people named Vasco are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Vasco in 2025?
- Vasco ranks #6143 among US boy names in 2025, with 14 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Vasco?
- About 1 in every 122,005 US boys born in 2025 was named Vasco — 14 in all.
- Will my child share the name Vasco with classmates?
- Vasco will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Vasco
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Ruel#6143 · Cornell#6143 · Kemper#6143 · Yates#6143 · Roark#6143 · Raja#6143 · Marquan#6143 · Orville#6143
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Vasco? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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