Kyle vs Ethan

How Kyle and Ethan 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

US Popularity History — Side-by-Side

Annual US births named Kyle (boys) vs Ethan (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	Kyle	Ethan
Peak year (most US births)	1990 — 22,710 boys	2004 — 22,210 boys
Peak rank	#18	#5
Most recent rank (2025)	#509 (594 births)	#24 (7,852 births)
Total US births since 1880	449,486	472,430
Last 10 years (2016–2025)	11,768	100,110

Peak comparison takeaway

At its all-time peak, Kyle reached 22,710 US births in 1990 — 500 more than Ethan's peak count.

Crossover Years

Years where one name first passed the other in annual US births. A name "winning" in a year means it had more births that year, not necessarily a higher rank.

Year	New leader	Kyle births	Ethan births
2000	Ethan	11,969	15,225

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.

Kyle — top 5 states

#	State	Avg rank	Births
1	Alaska	#147	48
2	Delaware	#151	40
3	Maine	#172	27
4	Hawaii	#176	53
5	Rhode Island	#199	31

Ethan — top 5 states

#	State	Avg rank	Births
1	Maryland	#7	1,997
2	New York	#7	7,360
3	California	#8	15,578
4	Florida	#10	6,485
5	New Jersey	#11	3,198

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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 →