Most Popular Baby Names 2023

[dirac]

Courtesy of Social Security. Excuse the dodgy spacing:

Rank                 Male name                Female name

1                        Liam                           Olivia

2                      Noah                          Emma

3                   Oliver                          Charlotte

4               James                              Amelia

5              Elijah                                Sophia

6             Mateo                             Mia

7           Theodore                      Isabella

8            Henry                          Ava

9           Lucas                         Evelyn

10          William                     Luna

You can also check out the popularity of names over time, by location, year, etc. This table charts the decline and fall of "Mary."  People also seem to be more venturesome with their sons' names these days.

Remarkable how some names I had thought were forever consigned to storage like chair doilies  (Emma, Amelia, etc.) have become big again.

 

[Jayne]

There is a subreddit called r/tragedeigh which makes fun of ridiculous spelling and invented names.  

[Mashinka]

It might be fun to compare with the British list.  

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cer3v1z81lpo

I'm a Mary, even at school there was just one girl in the school who shared my name.  It has been obsolete in Britain foe around eighty years, though that isn't the case in Ireland.

 

 

[dirac]

On 5/20/2024 at 3:50 AM, Jayne said:

There is a subreddit called r/tragedeigh which makes fun of ridiculous spelling and invented names.  

I've lost track of how many ways people spell Caitlin. I have no idea what's wrong with the received spelling, which is quite pretty.

Mashinka, I read somewhere that around midcentury half of the girls born in America were named Mary. It's many fewer now. The Social Security site could tell us by exactly how many.

Interesting that Oliver makes both the US and British lists. I was surprised to see it on the former. And what's with "Freddie"? Wasn't the Sussexes naming their son "Archie"  bad enough?

[Petra]

Interesting that Muhammad is no. 2 on the British boys'  list but there is no Muslim identifying name on the girls' list. As always, parents feel that they can break with tradition more easily with girls' names.