---
title: "Do Americans Change Their Race? From One Census to the Next, Millions Do"
description: "This links to a FactTank posting about research that used data from census questionnaires in 2000 and 2010 to analyze how many Americans changed their racial or ethnic identity from one census to the next. The result: At least 10 million did."
date: "2014-05-05"
authors:
  - name: "D’Vera Cohn"
    job_title: "Former Senior Writer/Editor"
    link: "https://www.pewresearch.org/staff/dvera-cohn/"
url: "https://www.pewresearch.org/social-trends/2014/05/05/do-americans-change-their-race-from-one-census-to-the-next-millions-do/"
---

# Do Americans Change Their Race? From One Census to the Next, Millions Do

At least 10 million Americans checked different boxes on the 2010 census form than they had in 2000 to describe their racial or Hispanic identity, according to new research presented at last week's Population Association of America meeting. Although smaller-scale studies have shown that racial and ethnic identity can change, this work was the first to use the census count of all Americans to provide a broad look at how selections may vary. [Read more at FactTank.](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2014/05/05/millions-of-americans-changed-their-racial-or-ethnic-identity-from-one-census-to-the-next/)