Demographics of New York (state)

New York State has a primarily urban population. The largest city in the state is New York City, which is also one of the world's most ethnically diverse and cosmopolitan cities. Additional major urban centers include Albany, Buffalo, Rochester and Syracuse. The state has 62 counties; the most populated one is Kings County (Brooklyn).

As of the 2010 census, New York State has a population of 19,378,102, including 12,740,974 (65.7%) white, 3,073,800 (15.9%) black, 1,420,244 (7.3%) Asian, 8,766 (0.0%) Pacific Islander, and 1,441,563 (7.4%) of other races. 585,849 (3.0%) has two or more races. Hispanics and Latinos of all races make up 3,416,922 (17.6%) of the state's population; non-Hispanic whites make up 58.3% of the state's population.

According to 2004 estimates, 20.4% of the population was foreign-born. Among cities in New York State, 36% of New York City's population is foreign-born; this figure of approximately 3 million is a higher total number of foreign-born residents than any other U.S. city.

New York contains the largest Puerto Rican population in the contiguous United States, concentrated in parts of New York City such as the Bronx, Brooklyn, and Manhattan. New York also has the largest Dominican population in the country, concentrated in New York City's Upper Manhattan and the Bronx. New York City is home to many blacks, the majority with roots in the United States but a group which includes those with roots in Caribbean Islands like Jamaica, Barbados, Guyana, Trinidad and Haiti, as well as recent immigrants from Sub-Saharan African countries. The Bronx has a large population of blacks that are of Latin American origin, but so does northern Manhattan (Harlem) and Brooklyn which had American-born black majorities since the 1920s, as well the largest African American population of any state. New York City has 1 million of New York State's 1.4 million Asian Americans. At 520,000 of New York State's over 600,000 Chinese Americans, New York City has a higher total number of Chinese Americans than Los Angeles County. New York also has the highest and growing proportion of Pakistani Americans and Bangladeshi Americans in the country, and a very high Indian American community, mainly concentrated in New York City. Unlike New York City, smaller cities in Upstate New York, especially Western New York, are not as diverse. Cities such as Buffalo and Rochester are predominantly made of African Americans, Puerto Ricans, and ethnic European whites.

Among New York State's cities, as of 2010, New York City is 44% white(33%non hispanic white),28% Latino, 25% African American, and 13% percent Asian American. The city of Buffalo, New York state's second-largest city, is 50% white (45% non-Hispanic white), 38% African American, 10% Latino, and 3% Asian American. The state capital of Albany is 57% white (64% non-Hispanic white), 30% African American, 8% Latino, and 5% Asian American.

New York ethnic distribution, 2000

In the 2000 Census, Italian Americans make up the largest ancestral group in Staten Island and Long Island, followed by Irish Americans and Polish Americans. Manhattan's leading ancestry group is Dominicans since the 2000 census, followed by Irish Americans, then Italian Americans and more than 200 nationalities are counted, plus comparably large numbers of residents with Dutch, Portuguese, Greek, Russian, and Swedish ancestry. Albany and southeast-central New York are heavily Irish American and Italian American. In Buffalo and western New York, German Americans are the largest group along with Polish Americans and other Slavic nationalities; in the northern tip of the state, French Canadians. New York State has a higher number of Italian-Americans than any other U.S. state. New York City is also said to be home to two million of Italian descent alone. NYC was once called the largest German, Greek, Irish, Italian, Polish and Russian communities outside their representative countries of origin.

Sometimes classified an ethnic group by some demographers and sometimes as a religious identity (Judaism), American Jews of various nationalities and various denominations, but most are American-born, are a major social presence in New York. An estimated 1 to 2 million alone in New York City and another 1 to 1.5 million live in surrounding areas, sometimes New York is referred to as the "world's largest Jewish city" since the mid-19th century. The first wave of Jewish immigrants in New York are of Sephardic origin, a scant 10,000 from the Netherlands, Italy, Spain and Portugal in the 17th and 18th centuries, but in the 19th century more newcomers were first German and finally in the early 20th century millions from Eastern Europe like Poland and Russia, both of Ashkenazi origin. In the late 20th century, a smaller wave of Russian Jews and Ukrainian Jews settled in the Brighton Beach section in Brooklyn, and New York has many Israeli-American residents.

The intense development, urbanization and suburban sprawl of New York City makes it the most populated region in the U.S., an estimated 20 to 30 million in the eight-state Megalopolis stretching 500 miles from Boston to Washington, D.C., with New York City in the middle has 15 million residents in a 100-mile radius including Philadelphia (1.5 million in its city limits), northern New Jersey and Connecticut. The bulk of New York's population lives within two hours of New York City. According to the July 1, 2004 Census Bureau Estimate,[6] New York City and its six closest New York State satellite counties (Suffolk, Nassau, Westchester, Rockland, Putnam and Orange) have a combined population of 12,626,200 people, or 65.67% of the state's population.

According to the 2000 U.S. Census, 13.61% of the population aged 5 and older speak Spanish at home, while 2.04% speak Chinese (including Cantonese and Mandarin), 1.65% Italian, and 1.23% Russian.[7] In age demographics: 6.5% of New York's population were under 5 years of age, 24.7% under 18, and 12.9% were 65 or older. Females made up 51.8% of the population. New York state has a fluctuating population growth rate, it has experienced some shrinkage in the 1970s and 1980s, but milder growth in the 1990s and the first decade of the 21st century.

Note: Births in table don't add up, because Hispanics are counted both by their ethnicity and by their race, giving a higher overall number.

• Since 2016, data for births of White Hispanic origin are not collected, but included in one Hispanic group; persons of Hispanic origin may be of any race.

The most common American English accents spoken, besides General American English, were the New York City area dialect (including New York Latino English and North Jersey English,) Hudson Valley English (including the Western New England accent around Albany,) and Inland Northern American English from the Buffalo and upstate New York area.

As of 2015, 70.72% (12,788,233) of New York residents age 5 and older spoke English at home as a primary language, while 14.44% (2,611,903) spoke Spanish, 2.61% (472,955) Chinese (which includes Cantonese and Mandarin), 1.20% (216,468) Russian, 1.18% (213,785) Italian, 0.79% (142,169) French Creole, 0.75% (135,789) French, 0.67% (121,917) Yiddish, 0.63% (114,574) Korean, and Polish was spoken as a main language by 0.53% (95,413) of the population over the age of five. In total, 29.28% (5,295,016) of New York's population age 5 and older spoke a mother language other than English.[15]

A 2014[16] survey found that the religious affiliations of the people of New York were:

• Christian – 60%
  • Catholic – 31%
  • Various Protestant denominations – 26%
  • Other Christian denominations – 3%
• Non-Religious – 27%
• Jewish – 7%
• Muslim – 2%
• Buddhist – 1%
• Hindu – 1%
• Other Religions – 1%
• No response given/Unknown - 1%

1% of the people surveyed refused to answer.

• Demographics of New York City