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NameAlmanac

What changed

Four changes since the Social Security Administration published its 2025 baby-name files on May 8, 2026: those files themselves, the rebuilt site of September 29, 2026, the Census Bureau’s 2020 count of each name and a new measure of what each state names. Newest first, each dated; corrections of errors are listed separately on the corrections page.

Updated

Changes, newest first

  1. The 2020 Census count of each name. Name records and the most-common-names study now give the Census Bureau’s count of each first name in the 2020 Census (released April 14, 2026) beside SSA’s births carried forward to the same day, with the difference stated.
  2. A fairer measure of what each state names. A state’s over-represented names are now measured against each name’s share among the names that state’s file lists, since the file leaves out names given to fewer than 5 babies; the lists show only names given at least 1.05 times as often as predicted, and each state page leads with 2016-2025.
  3. A new NameAlmanac. Every page was rebuilt around what SSA’s records can show: each name’s births by year with gaps where SSA recorded none, its girls-to-boys split over time, how many Americans with it are alive and how old they are (from SSA’s cohort life tables), the states where it is more common than its national share predicts, and names with a similar history. New pages cover generations, origins (as Wiktionary states them), unisex and rare names, and three studies. Meanings now come only from Wiktionary.
  4. SSA’s 2025 files. SSA published the names of babies born in 2025; every rank, trend and total on the site includes them.

Corrections: the corrections page.