White Americans


White Americans are Americans who identify as white people. In a more official sense, the United States Census Bureau, which collects demographic data on Americans, defines "white" as " person having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East, or North Africa". Individuals within this group have light skin tones and hair colors that include brown, blonde, black or red. White Americans have historically constituted the majority population in the United States, though their share has been gradually declining in recent decades. As of the latest American Community Survey conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau in 2024, an estimated 59.8% of the U.S. population—approximately 203.3 million people—identify as White alone, while Non-Hispanic Whites account for 56.3% of the population, or roughly 191.4 million people. Overall, 72.1% of Americans identify as White either alone or in combination with one or more other racial groups. European Americans are by far the largest panethnic group of white Americans and have constituted the majority population of the United States since the nation's founding. Middle Eastern Americans constitute a much smaller demographic of white Americans, making up around 1.1% of the US population in 2020.
According to the 2020 census, 61.6% of Americans, or 204,277,273 people, identified as White alone. This represented a national decrease from a 72.4% white alone share of the US population in the 2010 census. The share of Americans identifying as White alone or in combination was 71.0% in 2020, a smaller decline from 74.8% of the population in 2010. As opposed to the declines seen in the white alone population, the number of people identifying as part white saw a large increase, growing from 2.4% of the population in 2010, to 9.4% in 2020.
While the large decline in the white alone population observed between 2010 and 2020 has been partly attributed to natural trends, researchers have found that most of the sharp growth in the multiracial population, and commensurate decline in the white alone population, were due to changes in the methodology used by the Census Bureau, leading to a significant number of people who previously identified as white alone in 2010, mostly those identifying as White Hispanics, being reclassified as multiracial in 2020. In 2010, around 53% of Hispanics in the country identified as white alone, while in 2020, this number had declined to only 20.3% of Hispanics.
The US Census Bureau uses a particular definition of "white" that differs from some colloquial uses of the term. The Bureau defines "White" people to be those "having origins in any of the original peoples of Europe, the Middle East or North Africa". Within official census definitions, people of all racial categories may be further divided into those who identify as "not Hispanic or Latino" and those who do identify as "Hispanic or Latino". The term "non-Hispanic white", rather than just "white", may be the census group corresponding most closely to those persons who identify as and are perceived to be white in common usage; similarly not all Hispanic/Latino people identify as "white", "black", or any other listed racial category. In 2015, the Census Bureau announced their intention to make Hispanic/Latino and Middle Eastern/North African racial categories similar to "white" or "black", with respondents able to choose one, two, or more racial categories; this change was canceled during the Trump administration. Other persons who are classified as "white" by the US census but may or may not identify as or be perceived as "white" include Arab Americans and Jewish Americans of European or MENA descent. In the United States, the term White people generally denotes a person of European ancestry, but has been legally extended to people of West Asian and North African ancestry. However, in 2024, the Office of Management and Budget announced that the race categories used by the federal government would be updated, and that Middle Eastern and North African Americans will no longer be classified as white in the upcoming 2030 Census.

History

The Western concept of Whiteness originated in Iberia in the 15th century in the aftermath of the Reconquista. The Spanish described Europeans as White and pure in contrast to the darker Arabs, Jews, Gypsies, and other racial minorities who contaminated the blood of their homeland. As the pioneer of Western colonization, Spain spread its racial terminology across Europe and the world, with other European societies incorporating Spanish terms such as mulatto, negro, indio, and so on, into their own languages. By the 17th century, most European societies were using the term "White race" or "White people". The Spanish caste system, accompanied by the enslavement and dispossession of indigenous peoples and sub-Saharan Africans in the Spanish Empire, was directly transplanted to its colonies, as were similar caste systems in other European colonies.
In the context of American history, the term "white" was first used in early colonial Virginia as a way to justify racism against African Americans. The white ruling class in the colonies deemed black people inferior and suitable for slavery, and sought to draw a clear line between European settlers and white indentured servants, who were protected as citizens under colonial law, and chattel slaves of African descent, who possessed no legal rights.
The population of what would become the United States has been enumerated by racial categories since the first permanent British settlers arrived at Jamestown in 1607. A colonial census from 1620, just after the first enslaved Africans were transported to Virginia, recorded the colony's population as including 2,282 "White" individuals and 20 "Negroes". Estimates indicate that whites made up the majority of non-Indigenous inhabitants of the colonies in every year from 1620 to 1780. Following the independence of the United States, every census since 1790 has enumerated the population by perceived race or "color." Although the categories used by the census have varied over time, the classification of a "white" race has been included on every census conducted in the US. The white population, numbering 3,172,006 in 1790, was primarily composed of English descendants, with a smaller minority of Germans, Irish, and Scots. Over the following decades, the white population would grow steadily as the country expanded westward, reaching a population of 19,553,068 in 1850, or 80.7% of the total population. Immigration waves during the 19th and early 20th centuries further grew the white population, which reached 110,286,740 in 1930. The white population also grew considerably in diversity during that time period, driven by large amounts of immigration from Ireland, Italy, Eastern Europe, and Southern Europe, transforming a historically "White Anglo-Saxon Protestant" society into a melting pot of different European ethnic groups. The white population peaked as a percent of the population in 1940, at just under 90% of the total population, and has been gradually declining in share since then, reaching a historic low of 61.6% in 2020, as increased immigration from Asia and Latin America has gradually displaced Europe as the primary source of immigrants to the US.

Self-reported ancestry

The most commonly reported ancestries of White Americans include English, German, Irish, Italian, and Polish. It is difficult to track full or partial ancestry from Spain in White Hispanics, Mestizos, or Mulattoes since people of direct Spanish descent are also classified as Hispanic, and though the census does track Hispanics' national origin, it does not classify it by race. In 2020, 1,896,300 people claimed ancestry from Spain, 0.6% of the total population. However, genetic studies have found that the vast majority of Hispanics in the US have varying amounts of European ancestry, with the largest component being Spanish or Iberian. The English Americans' demography is also considered a serious under-count, as the stock tend to self-report and identify as simply "Americans", due to the length of time they have inhabited the United States, particularly if their family arrived prior to the American Revolution.
The following table lists all self-reported European and Middle Eastern ancestries with over 50,000 members, according to 2022 estimates from the American Community Survey:
AncestryNumber in 2022 Number as of 2022 % Total
German13,241,92341,137,16812.3%
English12,331,69631,380,6209.4%
Irish8,649,24330,655,6129.2%
American 14,929,89917,786,2145.3%
Italian5,766,63416,009,7744.8%
Polish2,658,6328,249,4912.5%
French 1,360,6316,310,5481.9%
Scottish1,555,5795,352,3441.6%
Broadly "European" 3,718,0554,819,5411.4%
Swedish740,4783,936,7721.2%
Norwegian1,224,3733,317,4621.0%
Dutch858,8093,019,4650.9%
Scotch-Irish940,3372,524,7460.8%
Arab, Egyptian, Syrian, Palestinian, Iraqi, Moroccan 1,502,3602,237,9820.7%
Russian747,8662,099,0790.6%
Spanish —1,926,2280.6%
French Canadian694,0891,626,4560.5%
Welsh293,5511,521,5650.5%
Portuguese543,5311,350,4420.4%
Hungarian390,5611,247,1650.4%
Greek486,8781,200,7060.4%
Broadly "British" 503,0771,196,2650.4%
Czech340,7681,188,7110.4%
Ukrainian565,4311,164,7280.3%
Danish268,0191,127,5180.3%
Broadly "Eastern European" 566,715951,3840.3%
Broadly "Scandinavian" 372,673935,1530.3%
Swiss196,120847,2470.3%
Finnish189,603606,0280.2%
Slovak186,902602,9490.2%
Lithuanian167,355598,5080.2%
Austrian123,987584,5170.2%
Canadian249,309542,4590.2%
Iranian392,051519,6580.2%
Armenian282,012458,8410.1%
Romanian251,069450,7510.1%
Broadly "Northern European" 273,675434,2920.1%
Croatian128,623389,2720.1%
Belgian96,361316,4930.1%
Turkish168,354239,6670.07%
Pennsylvania German155,563228,6340.07%
"Czechoslovakian" 79,992227,2170.07%
Albanian182,625223,9840.07%
"Yugoslavian" 129,759198,6870.06%
Serbian96,388191,5380.06%
Afghan169,255189,4930.06%
Slovene48,809153,5890.05%
Israeli80,336144,2020.04%
Broadly "Slavic" 57,491140,9560.04%
Bulgarian75,386106,8960.03%
Assyrian64,34993,5420.03%
Latvian33,74291,8590.03%
Cajun59,04691,7060.03%
Australian37,18088,9990.03%
Macedonian39,58665,1070.02%
Basque24,21962,7310.02%
Icelandic18,97853,4150.02%