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Tamara vs Sophia

How Tamara and Sophia 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

Tamara

Female · Hebrew

Meaning: Palm Tree

Sophia

Female · Greek

Meaning: Wise

US Popularity History — Side-by-Side

Annual US births named Tamara (girls) vs Sophia (girls), 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 Tamara Sophia
Peak year (most US births) 1970 — 4,721 girls 2012 — 22,335 girls
Peak rank #79 #1
Most recent rank (2009) #908 (300 births) #5 (12,561 births)
Total US births since 1880 52,931 388,433
Last 10 years (2000–2009) 5,100 133,616

Peak comparison takeaway

At its all-time peak, Sophia reached 22,335 US births in 2012 — 17,614 more than Tamara'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 Tamara births Sophia births
1997 Sophia 0 3,640

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 girls-name list.

Tamara — top 5 states

#StateAvg rankBirths
1 New Jersey #873 26

Sophia — top 5 states

#StateAvg rankBirths
1 New Mexico #3 769
2 New York #3 8,010
3 Illinois #3 4,861
4 Arizona #4 3,118
5 Massachusetts #4 2,790

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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 →