Nigerian Americans (; ; ) are an ethnic group of Americans who are of Nigerian ancestry. The number of Nigerian immigrants residing in the United States is rapidly growing, expanding from a small 1980 population of 25,000. The 2019 American Community Survey (ACS) estimated that 461,695 U.S. residents were of Nigerian ancestry. The 2019 ACS further estimated that around 392,811 of these (85%) had been born in Nigeria. Similar to its status as the most populous country in Africa, Nigeria is also the African country with the most migrants to the United States, as of 2013. In a study which was carried out by consumer genetics company 23andMe which involved the DNA of 50,281 people of African descent in the United States, Latin America, and Western Europe, It was revealed that Nigeria was the most common country of origin for testers from the United States, the French Caribbean, and the British Caribbean. Nigerian Americans, like British Nigerians, predominantly originate from southern Nigeria, as opposed to the Islamic northern half of the country. History Atlantic slave trade (17th century – 1808) The first people of ancestry from what is now modern Nigeria to arrive in what is now the modern United States were brought by force as slaves. Calabar and Badagry (Gberefu Island), Nigeria, became major points of export of enslaved people from Africa to the Americas during the 17th and 18th centuries. Most slave ships frequenting this port were English. Most of the slaves of Bight of Biafra – many of whom hailed from the Igbo hinterland – were trafficked to Virginia. After 400 years in the United States and the lack of documentation because of enslavement, African Americans have often been unable to track their ancestors to specific ethnic groups or regions of Africa. Like Americans of other origins, at this point most African Americans have ancestors of a variety of ethnic backgrounds. Most of the people who were stolen from Nigeria were likely to have been, Igbo or Yoruba. Other ethnic groups, such as the Fulani and Edo people were also captured and transported to the colonies in the New World. The Igbo were exported mainly to Maryland and Virginia. They comprised the majority of all enslaved Africans in Virginia during the 18th century: of the 37,000 Africans trafficked to Virginia from Calabar during the eighteenth century, 30,000 were Igbo. In the next century, people of Igbo descent