More than 70 million people in the United States identify as Hispanic. That is more than seven times the 9.6 million counted in 1970, and up from 62.1 million in 2020. But a new analysis from Pew Research Center shows that behind that headline number sits a harder question with no single answer: who, exactly, counts?
The answer, Pew finds, depends on three things: how the government counts, how people see their own race and ethnicity, and whether people with Hispanic roots choose the label at all. As Hispanic Heritage Month wraps up on Oct. 15, here is what the data shows.
The government’s definition is broad, but its counting has exceptions
Fifty years ago, Congress required the federal government to collect data on Americans of Spanish origin or descent. The law defined the group as people who “identify themselves as being of Spanish-speaking background and trace their origin or descent from Mexico, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Central and South America, and other Spanish-speaking countries.”
Most surveys, including Pew’s, Gallup’s and national exit polls, follow a simple rule: if you say you are Hispanic, you are. The Census Bureau mostly does the same, with exceptions. A person who checks “Other Hispanic” but writes in “Irish” is recoded as not Hispanic. A person who writes “Mexican” as their race but skips the Hispanic question is counted as Hispanic.
Officially, Brazilians are not considered Hispanic, because the federal definition covers people of “Spanish culture or origin.” The same goes for people with roots in Portugal, Belize and the Philippines. Census surveys typically “back code” those responses as not Hispanic.
A data error in 2020 showed how much those rules matter. Because of a processing mistake in that year’s American Community Survey, at least 416,000 Brazilians, more than two-thirds of all Brazilians in the U.S., were counted as Hispanic. The year before, the number was 14,000. The year after, it was 16,000.
Race and ethnicity don’t fit neatly into census boxes
Under federal standards, Hispanic is an ethnicity, not a race, so Hispanics can be of any race. Many Hispanics don’t experience those identities separately, and the numbers reflect it.
In the 2024 American Community Survey, 29.4 million Hispanics were counted as more than one race, the largest group of all. Another 23.4 million chose “some other race,” most often writing in an answer such as “Mexican,” “Latin American” or “Hispanic.” About 11.9 million chose White. Far fewer chose American Indian or Alaska Native (1.7 million), Black (1.2 million), Asian (0.3 million) or Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander (0.1 million).
The multiracial count has exploded, from just 3 million in 2010. Almost all of the growth came from people counted as both White and “some other race,” a group that rose from 1.6 million to 25 million between 2010 and 2024. Pew says the jump most likely reflects changes in how the 2020 census collected and coded answers, not a sudden shift in ancestry or in how people see themselves.
Skin color shapes experience, even if the census doesn’t measure it
Census forms don’t ask about skin color, but Latinos say it matters. In Pew’s 2021 National Survey of Latinos, 57% said skin color shapes their daily life at least some, 59% said lighter skin helps Latinos get ahead in the U.S. and 62% said darker skin hurts their ability to get ahead.
When shown a palette of 10 skin tones, eight in 10 Latino adults picked one of the four lightest. Just 3% picked one of the four darkest.
Some people with African and Latin American heritage identify as Afro-Latino, an identity rooted in the colonial era, when millions of enslaved Africans were taken to Spanish and Portuguese colonies. In Pew’s 2025 survey, 13% of Hispanic adults said they consider themselves Afro-Latino. Earlier Pew research found that some Afro-Latinos do not identify as Hispanic at all.
Most people prefer their family’s country over a label
“Hispanic” and “Latino” are used everywhere, but they are not how most people describe themselves. In Pew’s National Survey of Latinos, conducted in October 2025, 53% said they most often describe themselves by their family’s country of origin, such as Mexican or Mexican American. Another 27% most often use a pan-ethnic term such as Hispanic or Latino, and 18% most often call themselves simply American.
Asked which umbrella term they prefer for the group as a whole, 54% chose Hispanic, 30% chose Latino and 14% had no preference. Just 2% preferred Latinx or Latine, the terms that have drawn the most public debate.
Many Hispanics also reject the idea that identity requires a checklist. In 2022, 78% said speaking Spanish is not necessary to be Hispanic, including 93% of English-dominant Hispanics and 64% of Spanish-dominant Hispanics. In 2015, 84% said a Spanish last name is not required. Views on having Hispanic parents were split almost evenly: in 2019, 32% called it essential, 34% said it was important but not essential, and 33% said it was not important.
The identity is getting harder to pin down
Families are changing the picture. In 2024, 23% of married Hispanics living with a spouse were married to someone who is not Hispanic. Among Hispanic newlyweds, it was 32%. The gap by birthplace is wide: 44% of U.S.-born Hispanic newlyweds married someone who isn’t Hispanic, compared with 15% of immigrants.
Over generations, Hispanic ancestry doesn’t always become Hispanic identity. Pew surveys from 2015 and 2016 found that about 11% of U.S. adults with Hispanic ancestry, about 5 million people, did not identify as Hispanic. The share who do falls with each generation, from 97% of immigrants to 92% of the second generation, 77% of the third generation and just 50% of the fourth generation or later.
Why it matters
The Hispanic population count shapes political maps, federal funding, business strategy and how a fast-growing share of the country is represented. Pew’s analysis is a reminder that the number is not a fixed fact about a population. It is the product of choices: how a government writes its forms, how an agency codes an answer and how millions of people decide, often differently across generations, who they are.
Source: Pew Research Center, “Who is Hispanic?” by Mark Hugo Lopez, Joseph Copeland and Jeffrey S. Passel, Sept. 15, 2026.