Reports & Research
Original data, reference resources, and research reports on baby naming — built for educators, journalists, parenting publications, and anyone researching how babies are named today and across history. Each resource below is free to reference with attribution.
Featured Reports
Annual flagship + latest year rankingTop Baby Names of 2025 — Official SSA Rankings and Movers →
The latest US top 10 for girls and boys, official birth counts, rank and birth-count momentum, a near-top-100 watchlist, and the names that reached #1 in each state. Every table is generated from imported 2025 SSA national and state files rather than copied from a secondary list.
Sourced from SSA national totals, with scope and privacy limits stated on the report page. Free to cite with attribution.
Now LiveThe State of Baby Naming 2026 — A 146-Year Retrospective →
A multi-decade synthesis using 65,411 rows of US Social Security Administration data covering 146 consecutive years (1880–2025). 15 quote-ready findings, decade-by-decade naming fingerprints, the Mary phenomenon (76-year reign), Linda's 1947 peak (99,693 births), the great fragmentation of American naming, gender-neutral name flow, and the steepest climbers into the 2024 top 10.
Sourced entirely from the SSA dataset documented at /methodology. Includes 2 charts, full citation formats, and a press kit with copy-able quote-ready statements. Free to cite with attribution.
Atlas Hubs
Browseable cross-sections of the SSA datasetWhat the Top 100 Cutoff Really Means
Inspect 2025 ranks 90–110 instead of treating #100 as a natural boundary. The girls’ and boys’ #100 names differed from #101 by only 11 and 10 births.
/reports/top-100-baby-name-cutoff-20252015–2025 Top 100 Stability
Find the 60 girls’ and 67 boys’ exact spellings that stayed top 100 for eleven consecutive years, with large movers and endpoint turnover kept distinct.
/reports/top-100-name-stability-2015-2025What “Unranked” Means in SSA Data
Decode missing national and state rows, privacy suppression, exact spellings, sex-separated lists, site truncation, and the claims an absent result cannot support.
/reports/what-unranked-means-ssa-baby-name-dataBaby Names by Decade
15 standalone decade pages 1880s–2020s. Top 20 boys + girls per decade, signature names unique to each, names that emerged that decade, names that died after.
/reports/baby-names-by-decadeBaby Names by US State
51 standalone state pages (50 states + DC). 2,335,053 SSA state-level records 1910–2025. Top 20 all-time, latest-year top 10, signature names per state.
/reports/baby-names-by-stateState Distinctiveness Atlas
The single most-uniquely-owned name for each US state — Hawaii's most-Hawaiian name, Utah's most-Mormon, New Mexico's most-Spanish. Hub linking to all 51 state detail pages.
/reports/state-distinctivenessFocused Reports
Single-topic deep divesEach focused report develops one specific research angle from the dataset as an independent citable URL — useful when a journalist or researcher needs a focused source on one specific topic rather than the full annual synthesis.
How Common Is a Popular Baby Name?
Turn representative 2025 ranks into per-birth frequency and adjustable peer-group scenarios. Uses complete SSA annual denominators, states the formula, and explains why a national baseline is not a classroom forecast.
/reports/how-common-is-a-baby-name-2025Same Sound, Different Rank: 2025 Spelling Variants
Ten hand-reviewed spelling families from the complete SSA national files—plus the ambiguous clusters we refused to combine. Exact ranks, combined births, year-over-year shifts, and a parent decision guide.
/reports/baby-name-spelling-variants-2025Biggest Rises & Falls
The steepest sustained climbs and falls across 145 years. Nevaeh's 15,840-rank ascent, Brittany's 426-rank collapse, Bentley's 1-year viral spike — every #1 girls' name's collapse from the top.
/reports/biggest-rises-and-fallsNames That Died
A 145-year analysis of which once-dominant US baby names have functionally disappeared by 2024. The 1950s girls' top 20 is now 95% extinct; the 1950s boys' top 20 is 75% intact.
/reports/names-that-diedPop Culture × Baby Naming
12 verified case studies of how films, TV shows, and celebrities translate into US baby-name spikes. Khaleesi, Bella, Aaliyah, Princess Diana — plus the null result: Edward.
/reports/pop-culture-namingOrigins of American Baby Naming
145-year tradition atlas. Spanish-origin tripled their share (2.9%→9%); Arabic quadrupled (0.9%→3.3%); German dropped from 15.1% to 5.6%. Surging individuals: Luna 72×, Enzo 46×.
/reports/origins-of-baby-namingReligious Naming Trends
Hebrew/Biblical, Arabic/Islamic, Hindu/Sanskrit, and Greco-Christian Orthodox naming traditions analyzed across 145 years. Hebrew dominates; Arabic +13×; Hindu +7×.
/reports/religious-naming-trendsSibling Name Pair Patterns
How US parents pick matching sibling names. Same-letter pairs, shared Biblical canon, and phonetic-rhythm matching — three patterns from SSA co-occurrence.
/reports/sibling-name-patternsTwin Name Patterns
Same-letter twins (Emma + Emily), rhyming twins (Aiden + Jayden), and triplet sets (-aden cluster). 145-year SSA same-gender same-year co-occurrence detection.
/reports/twin-name-patternsName Length & Phonetic Patterns
Girls' names averaged 5.31 letters in 1880s, peaked at 6.54 in 1990s, contracted back to 5.72 by 2020s. Starting-letter and ending-sound shifts across 145 years.
/reports/name-length-phoneticsInteractive Tools
5 free SSA-data-driven toolsTools that let users query the same SSA dataset directly. Pick a birth year and see top 10 names. Score sibling-name compatibility. Look up which states have the most births of a name. See what's trending right now.
Names by Birth Year
Pick any year 1880–2025; see top 10 + today's rank.
What's Trending Now
Latest year's biggest climbers + decliners.
Name → State Lookup
Reverse lookup: which states have the most of any given name.
Sibling Match Score
0–100 compatibility score across 6 dimensions.
Numerology Calculator
Destiny + Soul Urge + Personality numbers.
Methodology & Press
Related Resources
- Full A–Z baby-name dictionary — 19,862 entries with meanings, origins, and pronunciations
- Curated name collections — by theme, era, cultural tradition, naming style
- Names by origin — Hebrew, Greek, Irish, Arabic, Japanese, and more
- Names by meaning — search across thousands of meanings
- Naming tips & guides — 799 in-depth articles
- Research data downloads — generate attributed CSV or JSON extracts for national rankings, name history, state rankings, and annual movers