Name discovery tool · source-aware
Baby Name Popularity by Year
Follow and compare up to three first-name spellings in U.S. Social Security birth records from 1880 through 2025, with published counts and calculated positions.
01 · Choose your filters
Set your course.
Search one spelling or compare up to three within the same recorded-sex field. Every chart point is a published annual count, not an estimate for a missing year.
Inputs are processed by our generation service. They are not added to a public name bank.
02 · Explore
Your results
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Practical guide
Make this tool useful.
Read an annual record
The chart and detailed annual records show published births with an exact spelling in one year and recorded-sex field. The displayed position is calculated from names in the pinned source file for that year, not an official SSA ranking.
Understand an empty year
No published entry does not mean zero births. The name may be recorded under another spelling or be absent because Social Security suppresses small counts. We do not fill gaps or invent a trend value.
Compare carefully
Compare at most three exact spellings in one SSA recorded-sex field. The chart uses raw published counts with visible gaps. Counts across different years are not population-adjusted, and Social Security application coverage changed over time. A shared chart makes trends easier to inspect but does not turn counts into birth shares.
Questions about this tool
How current is the data?
Our published national SSA files currently run through 2025. We will add a newer year only after its source file has been imported and checked.
Does the sex field describe a person’s identity?
No. It reflects the sex reported in historical Social Security card application records and can contain errors.
Why does the chart have a gap?
The SSA did not publish that exact spelling and recorded-sex combination for the year. A gap is not a zero count, so the chart does not connect through it.
Want a guided reading?
Explore our curated name histories and annual field notes. Each uses the same published SSA files and explains what the records can and cannot establish.
Read our data sources and selection rules before using a result as evidence of popularity.