How the numbers work

Every figure on NameTides comes from an official statistics agency. We do not estimate missing names, add countries together or merge spellings. This page explains exactly what we do with the published numbers.

What the sources count

US: the Social Security Administration counts Social Security card applications for babies born in each year, nationally since 1880 and by state since 1910. Names given to fewer than 5 babies in a year (or in a state) are not published.
England & Wales: the Office for National Statistics counts live births occurring in each year since 1996. Names given to 2 or fewer babies are withheld.
Scotland: National Records of Scotland counts births registered in each year since 1974. Names given to 2 or fewer babies are withheld.
Northern Ireland: NISRA counts births registered in each year since 1997. Names given to 2 or fewer babies are withheld.
Canada: Statistics Canada publishes national counts since 1991 (names given to fewer than 5 babies and single-letter names are excluded). Quebec (since 1980) and Ontario (since 1913) publish their own full lists; Ontario’s runs about a year behind. We never add the provinces to the national figures.
Ireland: the Central Statistics Office publishes every name given to 3 or more babies, by year of registration, since 1964, with official ranks.
Victoria: Births, Deaths and Marriages Victoria publishes its top 100 names each year since 2008; like New South Wales it appears in rank charts only.
New South Wales: the NSW registry publishes only its top 100 names each year since 1952. Outside the top 100 we have no figure, so NSW appears in rank charts only. Queensland’s, South Australia’s and New Zealand’s data could not be retrieved, and Australia publishes no national list; we never add Australian states together.

The UK figures for Scotland and Northern Ireland are by year of registration, not birth, so a December baby registered in January counts in the next year. See data sources for licences and links.

Missing is never zero

When a name is absent from a year’s list, it means fewer babies were given it than the publication threshold, not that none were. Our charts show those years as gaps in the line, never as a drop to zero. Hatched areas mark years a source did not cover at all.

Spellings are kept apart

Agencies count each spelling as a different name, and so do we. Olivia and Olivea have their own ranks. Accents are an exception only where the agency itself removed them (Scotland and Northern Ireland record Zoë as Zoe). One page covers spellings that differ only in accents, hyphens or punctuation, and shows each spelling’s official figures side by side.

Combined spellings

For some names we also show a combined figure, for example Aiden with Aidan, Ayden and Aden. A person checks every group before it appears. The combined count adds the official counts of each spelling in the same list, and the combined rank is the position that total would hold if the group were one name. This is our calculation, not an official statistic. It is not shown for New South Wales, whose top-100 list leaves out spellings below the cut-off.

No UK total

There is no official ranking for the UK as a whole. England & Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland publish separately, with different thresholds and year definitions, so we show them side by side and never add them up.

Ranks

For the UK we use the ranks each agency publishes. The SSA publishes counts only, so we rank US names ourselves: highest count first, and names with the same count share a rank (1, 2, 2, 4). Ranks are calculated separately for girls and boys, and for each state.

“About 1 in N” and “per 1,000”

Shares are calculated against the total of all babies in the same published list (same place, year and sex). Because names below the threshold are left out of every list, this total is a little smaller than the number of births, so shares are slightly higher than a share of all births would be. “In a group of 1,000 children born that year” uses the same share for one sex.

Trends and comebacks

Rising and falling compare a name’s share of babies in the latest year with its share five years earlier. A name counts as rising at +25% or more and falling at −20% or more. The trend lists only include names in the current top 1,000 with at least 100 babies (US) or 20 babies (UK nations).
Peak is the year with the highest share of babies, not the highest count, because the number of births changes over time.
A comeback is a name that peaked at least 30 years ago, fell to a quarter of that peak or less, and has since at least tripled from its low point.

Next-year estimates

For names reported in each of the last five years, we fit a straight line to the logarithm of the share of babies (a constant-percentage trend) and extend it one year. The range is the line’s typical error over those five years, about 95% coverage if the recent trend simply continues. It ignores fashion shocks such as a hit TV character, so treat it as a rough guide. NameTides labels every estimate; the official figure arrives with the next release.

Full-name flow check

The flow check applies fixed rules, with no scoring and no AI. It flags initials that spell a word on a short list (such as SOB or PIG). It also notes first names and surnames that start with the same consonant sound, end with the same three letters, or run together (vowel into vowel, or s into s). Finally it notes when every part has one syllable, or the whole name has nine or more. Every note is a prompt to say the name aloud, not a judgement.

Which names have their own page in search engines

Every name in the data has a page, but we only ask search engines to index names with a meaningful record: a top-1,000 rank with at least 10 babies in a national list in any year, or at least 200 babies since 1990 in one list. Rarer names remain available here but are not promoted.

Corrections and updates

Agencies sometimes revise earlier years. Each yearly update reloads the full history from the new release rather than adding one year on top. If you spot an error, tell us.