Jerry
- Pronunciation
- [Je-rry]
- Gender
- Male
- Meaning
- Abbreviation Of Names Beginning With Jer- See Also Gerry.
- Origin
- English
About the Name Jerry
Jerry is the English short form of Jerome, Jeremy, Jeremiah, or Gerald (see separate entries for the various Hebrew/Greek/Germanic etymologies). Jerry has been used as a casual diminutive in English-speaking countries since at least the 18th century, transitioning from nickname to standalone first name in 19th and 20th-century American naming.
Notable bearers include the iconic American comedian Jerry Seinfeld (Jerome Allen Seinfeld, born 1954, the iconic American stand-up comedian and creator-star of NBC's Seinfeld 1989–1998 — making him one of the foundational figures of late-20th-century American TV comedy); American singer Jerry Garcia (Jerome John Garcia, 1942–1995, the iconic American guitarist of The Grateful Dead); the iconic American basketball star Jerry West (using West as a surname, 1938–2024, the iconic American NBA Hall of Famer whose iconic silhouette became the official NBA logo); and the iconic Hanna-Barbera animated character Jerry Mouse of Tom and Jerry 1940–present.
Jerry held a US top-25 boys' rank from 1942 through 1980 — about four decades of consistent American popularity, peaking around 1947 at #15 in the United States. The name has receded since but remains in steady use, currently sitting in the US top 300 boys' rank. The name's appeal is its compact warm classical-American register — two short syllables, soft consonants, instantly readable, and the in-built Jerome-classical or Gerald-Germanic religious pedigree. The strong Jerry Seinfeld, Jerry Garcia, and Jerry West American cultural anchors maintain the name's relevance. The name reads as both classical-vintage and contemporary American. Common nicknames are scarce since Jerry is itself a nickname-shape — Jer (the dominant short form, casual and warm), Jere, and the rare Jerre each occasionally appear; the longer formal Jerome, Jeremy, Jeremiah, or Gerald are sometimes used as Jerry's official-document version. International forms include the broader Gerald/Jerome family across European languages.
Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.
Quick Facts About Jerry
US Popularity History (1880–2025)
Annual US births named Jerry by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 1947 with 18,791 boys named Jerry (boy rank #20 that year).
Where it stands today: in 2025, ranked #907 for boys (262 US births). That's 887 places below its 1947 peak.
Source: US Social Security Administration. Limitations: US birth-certificate data only; names appearing fewer than 5 times in a given year are suppressed for privacy; spelling variants are counted separately. For names that ranked outside the US top 100 before year 2000, only the years they reached the top 100 are shown — the chart may have gaps for less-popular historical names.
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Where in the US Is Jerry Most Popular?
Average boy-name rank within each state across 2016–2025 SSA records. A lower number means the name appears closer to the top of that state's boys-name rankings — a per-capita measure that isn't biased toward large states. For Jerry the strongest states are Mississippi, Arkansas, Nevada.
Strongest boys-name states
Weakest boys-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Colorado | #804 | 27 |
| 2 | Illinois | #799 | 81 |
| 3 | Pennsylvania | #790 | 51 |
| 4 | New Jersey | #788 | 47 |
| 5 | Washington | #753 | 24 |
| 6 | Maryland | #730 | 45 |
| 7 | Minnesota | #721 | 21 |
| 8 | Georgia | #715 | 114 |
| 9 | Michigan | #696 | 89 |
| 10 | Arizona | #695 | 52 |
Source: SSA state-level baby-name dataset 2016–2025. States with fewer than 3 years of data for Jerry in this window are excluded. Births < 5 in a given state-year are suppressed by SSA for privacy.
Famous People Named Jerry
8 notable figures from history and culture who share the name Jerry.
- Jerry Bruckheimer is one of the most influential and successful American filmmakers and television producers.
- Jerry Jones — Entrepreneur (1942)
- Jerry Lee Lewis — Rock Singer (1926)
- Jerry Lewis — Movie Actor (1926)
- Jerry Rice — Football Player (1962)
- Jerry Seinfeld — Comedian (1954)
- Jerry Springer — TV Show Host (1944)
- Jerry Yang is a Taiwanese-American internet entrepreneur, best known as the co- founder, and the former CEO of Yahoo! Inc.
Looking for names like Jerry?
A dedicated page with 60+ related names — spelling variants, rhymes, alliterations, same-origin matches, and shared meaning concepts — lives at its own URL so each kind of similarity gets a deeper treatment than fits here.
Compare Jerry to Other Popular Names
Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Jerry against today's most popular boys-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).