9BabyNames Baby names with meanings & US popularity data Italiano

Branson vs Alexander

How Branson and Alexander compare across 146 years of US Social Security Administration baby-name records — popularity history, peak years, current rank, and which name overtook which.

Open Name Tournament

Branson

Male · Irish

Meaning: Variant Of Brandon.

Alexander

Male · Greek

Meaning: Defender Of Man

US Popularity History — Side-by-Side

Annual US births named Branson (boys) vs Alexander (boys), from US Social Security Administration national records.

Source: US Social Security Administration. Names appearing fewer than 5 times per year are suppressed by SSA.

Quick Stats

Metric Branson Alexander
Peak year (most US births) 2014 — 377 boys 1993 — 20,529 boys
Peak rank #675 #21
Most recent rank (2021) #926 (244 births) #30 (7,230 births)
Total US births since 1880 5,251 657,737
Last 10 years (2012–2021) 3,223 100,533

Peak comparison takeaway

At its all-time peak, Alexander reached 20,529 US births in 1993 — 20,152 more than Branson's peak count.

Strongest States — Last 10 Years

States where each name ranked highest, from SSA's state-level dataset. Lower average rank = name appears closer to the top of that state's boys-name list.

Branson — top 5 states

#StateAvg rankBirths
1 West Virginia #257 79
2 Kentucky #402 105
3 Mississippi #437 56
4 Louisiana #471 103
5 Tennessee #524 128

Alexander — top 5 states

#StateAvg rankBirths
1 California #10 14,894
2 Arizona #10 2,337
3 Illinois #10 4,042
4 Nevada #11 990
5 Florida #11 6,338

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Data & methodology

Source: US Social Security Administration national baby names dataset 1880–2025 (CC0 public domain). Names with fewer than 5 occurrences in a given year are suppressed by SSA. State-level coverage runs 1910–2025. Crossover detection compares annual birth counts (not ranks) for each year both names appear. Methodology: see full notes. More comparisons →