Barney — #9865 US boys' name

What the Data Says About Barney

The Social Security Administration has registered 16,085 babies named Barney between 1880 and 2024, spanning 145 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Barney currently holds the #9865 rank among boys for 2024. The name reached its historical peak in 1919, when 304 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Barney performed strongest in the 1950s, accumulating 2,672 births during that ten-year window. Across the 15 decades of recorded activity, Barney shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in Texas, which accounts for 1,489 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by New York and California. In total, SSA state-level files list Barney in 37 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Barney in our reference dataset. These figures derive from SSA's annual national and state-level name files, which include any name appearing at least five times in a given year or state-year; names below that threshold are suppressed for privacy and therefore excluded from the totals shown here. The 16,085 total represents a lower bound — actual usage may be higher in years or states where the count fell below the disclosure floor. This page is provided for informational and research purposes only and does not constitute personal, legal, or naming advice.