# Black Hispanic and Latino Americans
**Black Hispanic and Latino Americans**, often called Afro-Latinos or Afro-Latinas, are people in the United States who identify as both Black or African American and Hispanic or Latino, or who self-identify with Afro-Latino labels such as Afro-Caribbean, Afro-Colombian, or Afro-Mexican. In 2020 there were about 6 million Afro-Latino adults in the United States, roughly 2% of the U.S. adult population and 12% of the adult Latino population[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Population | About 6 million Afro-Latino adults in 2020, about 2% of U.S. adults and 12% of the adult Latino population[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
| Hispanic identity | About one-in-seven Afro-Latinos, an estimated 800,000 adults, do not identify as Hispanic[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
| Census count | 1.2 million people of all ages identified as both Hispanic and Black on the 2020 census, far below survey-based estimates of Afro-Latino identity[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
| Racial self-identification | On a census-style race question, about 30% of Afro-Latinos chose White, 25% Black, 23% some other race, 16% multiple races, and 1% Asian[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
| Skin color | 37% of Afro-Latinos selected darker skin colors (positions 5 to 10 on a 10-point scale), compared with 15% of Hispanic adults overall[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
| Police stops | 22% of Afro-Latinos reported being unfairly stopped by police in the prior year, versus 8% of other Latinos[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
| Origins | Afro-Latinos are more likely to be of Puerto Rican or Dominican origin and less likely to be Mexican than Latino adults overall[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/) |
## Historical roots
Afro-Latino identity has deep roots in colonial Latin America, where mixing occurred among indigenous Americans, White Europeans, Asians, and enslaved people from Africa[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). The scale of the African presence in Latin America was large: during the colonial period, about 15 times as many African slaves were taken to Spanish and Portuguese colonies as to the territory that became the United States[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). Today about 130 million people of African descent live in Latin America, roughly a quarter of the region's population, according to estimates from the Project on [Ethnicity](https://www.edgepedia.org/ethnicity) and Race in Latin America (PERLA) at Princeton University[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
In the United States, Afro-Latino history includes figures such as Arturo Schomburg, an Afro-Puerto Rican archivist and writer who moved to New York in 1891 and documented the histories of [Black people](https://www.edgepedia.org/black-people) across the diaspora; the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in Harlem, which he founded in 1925, bears his name[2](https://time.com/6213368/afro-latino-history/).
## Measuring the population
The U.S. census treats Hispanic or Latino origin and race as two separate concepts, following [Office of Management and Budget](https://www.edgepedia.org/office-of-management-and-budget) standards that require two ethnicity categories (Hispanic or Latino, and Not Hispanic or Latino) and five minimum race categories[3](https://cdn.www.census.gov/programs-surveys/decennial-census/decade/2020/planning-management/release/faqs-race-ethnicity.html). Because Hispanic origin is not a race, a respondent can be Black and Hispanic at the same time, and the census records both[3](https://cdn.www.census.gov/programs-surveys/decennial-census/decade/2020/planning-management/release/faqs-race-ethnicity.html).
**Survey estimates differ from census counts.** [Pew Research Center](https://www.edgepedia.org/pew-research-center) asked adults directly whether they identify as Afro-Latino, independently of the race and ethnicity questions, and estimated 6 million Afro-Latino adults in 2020. The 2020 census, by contrast, counted 1.2 million people of all ages as both Hispanic and Black. Asking directly yields a higher share than counting anyone who identifies as Hispanic and Black in the census's two-step format[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
Estimates also vary across surveys by wording and mode. A 2014 telephone survey that listed many Afro-Latino subgroups such as Afro-Caribbean and Afro-Peruvian found 24% of Hispanic adults identifying as Afro-Latino, while online surveys using shorter wording in 2019 through 2021 found 12%[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). A 2015 Pew survey similarly found about one-in-four Latino adults (24%) considering themselves Afro-Latino, Afro-Caribbean, or another Afro-Latino origin[4](https://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2015/06/2015-06-11_multiracial-in-america_final-updated.pdf).
Census measurement itself changed in ways that affect these counts. Princeton researchers argued that the large multiracial increase in the 2020 census was partly an artifact of new coding procedures: respondents who marked a single race such as [Black or White](https://www.edgepedia.org/black-or-white) but wrote in a Latin American origin were reclassified by an algorithm as multiracial[5](https://apnews.com/article/91376f5a672b698e4875fbee952aac46). The Census Bureau said at the time that the new method better captured how people identify their race and ethnicity[5](https://apnews.com/article/91376f5a672b698e4875fbee952aac46). Separately, the 2020 census undercounted Black, Latino, and Native American populations while overcounting non-Hispanic White and Asian American populations, according to a Census Bureau post-enumeration survey[6](https://www.axios.com/2022/03/10/2020-census-black-native-latino-undercount).
## Identity and skin color
Afro-Latino identity can exist alongside Hispanic, racial, and national-origin identities rather than replacing them[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). When asked their race on a census-style question, Afro-Latinos spread across categories: about three-in-ten selected White, 25% Black, 23% some other race, and 16% multiple races. Those who did not identify as Latino were much more likely to mark Black as their race, 59% versus 17% among those who did[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
Skin color shapes how Afro-Latinos are seen and how they see themselves. In Pew's March 2021 National Survey of Latinos, which used a version of the 10-color Yadon-Ostfeld skin-color scale, 37% of Afro-Latinos selected a darker skin color (positions 5 through 10), compared with 15% of Hispanic adults overall and 12% of non-Afro-Latino Hispanics[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). More broadly, 57% of Latino adults say skin color shapes their daily life experiences a lot or some, and about half say discrimination based on race or skin color is a very big problem in the United States[7](https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2021/11/04/majority-of-latinos-say-skin-color-impacts-opportunity-in-america-and-shapes-daily-life/).
Afro-Latinos who identify as Hispanic or Latino are more likely than other Latinos to say strangers would see them as multiracial or mixed race (12% versus 4%) or as Black (7% versus 1%), and less likely to say they would be seen as White (7% versus 19%)[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
## Discrimination experiences
Afro-Latinos report discrimination at rates similar to other Latinos overall, with two exceptions. In the March 2021 survey, 61% of Afro-Latinos said they personally experienced at least one of eight discrimination incidents in the prior year, compared with 54% of Latinos who do not identify as Afro-Latino[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). The two statistically significant differences were police stops, reported by 22% of Afro-Latinos versus 8% of other Latinos, and being criticized for speaking Spanish in public, reported by about three-in-ten Afro-Latinos versus about two-in-ten other Latinos[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). The most commonly reported experience among both groups was people acting as if they thought they were not smart, at 43% of Afro-Latinos and 34% of other Latinos[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
Afro-Latinos are also more likely to have had family conversations while growing up about challenges they might face because of their race or ethnicity: about four-in-ten say this happened often (12%) or sometimes (27%), compared with about a quarter of other Latinos (7% often, 18% sometimes)[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
Research on Hispanic Black identity describes an in-between position: Hispanic Black people may not be seen as Black by [African Americans](https://www.edgepedia.org/african-americans), nor as Hispanic by their Latin American and Caribbean peers, and not as non-Hispanic White either, which can leave them more vulnerable to intergroup discrimination and to a sense of cultural homelessness[8](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11292280/).
## Demographics
Afro-Latino adults are younger and less likely to have attended college than the overall U.S. adult population. In 2020, three-in-ten Afro-Latino adults were ages 18 to 29, compared with two-in-ten of all U.S. adults, and the share of Afro-Latino adults who had graduated college was about half the roughly three-in-ten rate among all U.S. adults[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/). Their national origins differ from those of Latinos overall, with greater representation of Puerto Rican and Dominican heritage and less Mexican heritage[1](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/).
## References
1. [Ana Gonzalez-Barrera (2022). About 6 million U.S. adults identify as Afro-Latino. Pew Research Center.](https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/05/02/about-6-million-u-s-adults-identify-as-afro-latino/)
2. [National Hispanic Heritage Month Is Incomplete Without Afro-Latino History, TIME](https://time.com/6213368/afro-latino-history/)
3. [2020 Census Frequently Asked Questions About Race and Ethnicity, U.S. Census Bureau](https://cdn.www.census.gov/programs-surveys/decennial-census/decade/2020/planning-management/release/faqs-race-ethnicity.html)
4. [Multiracial in America (2015), Pew Research Center](https://assets.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/3/2015/06/2015-06-11_multiracial-in-america_final-updated.pdf)
5. [Multiracial boom in 2020 census was mostly an illusion, researchers say, Associated Press](https://apnews.com/article/91376f5a672b698e4875fbee952aac46)
6. [2020 census undercounted Black, Latino, and Native Americans, Axios](https://www.axios.com/2022/03/10/2020-census-black-native-latino-undercount)
7. [Majority of Latinos say skin color impacts opportunity in America and shapes daily life, Pew Research Center](https://www.pewresearch.org/hispanic/2021/11/04/majority-of-latinos-say-skin-color-impacts-opportunity-in-america-and-shapes-daily-life/)
8. [The Hispanic/Latino Population in the United States: Our Black Identity, Our Health and Well-Being, PMC](https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11292280/)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Society and history › Social life and human behavior › Communities and populations › Diasporas and descent communities*
*Initially written Sep 17, 2026 · Reviewed: Sep 17, 2026; Sep 30, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
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