Berel
Berel was given to 13 boys in 2025, #6,497 among boys’ names; 195 Americans have been recorded with it since 1952 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Berel by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Berel mean?
Wiktionary, English section
Berel is “a male given name from Yiddish or Hebrew”
Meaning: Wiktionary, English section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Berel?
#6,497 among boys’ names, 2025
Berel rose from #10,826 in 2015 to #6,497 in 2025 among boys’ names; its share of boys born rose from 3.1 to 7.6 per million.
13 babies in 2016, the peak
Berel peaked in 2016, when 13 boys were given it, #6,398 among boys’ names. The 13 births of 2025 are 100% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 13 | #6,497 | 7.6 |
| 2024 | 11 | #7,317 | 6.4 |
| 2023 | 6 | #10,996 | 3.5 |
| 2022 | 10 | #7,827 | 5.7 |
| 2021 | 10 | #7,665 | 5.7 |
| 2020 | 10 | #7,581 | 5.8 |
| 2019 | 13 | #6,451 | 7.2 |
| 2018 | 6 | #10,947 | 3.3 |
| 2017 | 8 | #8,945 | 4.3 |
| 2016 | 13 | #6,398 | 6.9 |
Every recorded year (25)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 6 | #10,826 | 3.1 |
| 2014 | 9 | #8,214 | 4.7 |
| 2013 | 7 | #9,756 | 3.7 |
| 2012 | 8 | #8,958 | 4.2 |
| 2011 | 7 | #9,728 | 3.7 |
| 2010 | 6 | #10,916 | 3.1 |
| 2009 | 8 | #9,077 | 4.0 |
| 2008 | 6 | #11,217 | 2.9 |
| 2007 | 7 | #9,881 | 3.4 |
| 2004 | 5 | #11,550 | 2.5 |
| 1992 | 5 | #8,550 | 2.5 |
| 1977 | 5 | #5,932 | 3.0 |
| 1960 | 6 | #3,693 | 2.8 |
| 1959 | 5 | #4,040 | 2.3 |
| 1952 | 5 | #3,785 | 2.6 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Berel a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Berel has been recorded only for boys: SSA lists no girls with the name in 25 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Berel: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Berel, and how old are they?
An estimated 188 Americans named Berel and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (97% of everyone recorded); the median is 10 years old and half are between 5 and 16. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 201 people named Berel (4 women and girls, 197 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 133 born in the U.S. The Census count is 1.5 times that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
Living estimate: SSA births carried forward with the survival rates in SSA’s cohort life tables (2024 Trustees Report) for each birth year and sex. How the estimate is made. Count: Census Bureau, first names in the 2020 Census (released April 14, 2026; names reported 100 or more times, with the Bureau’s disclosure-avoidance adjustment).
Where are babies named Berel born?
| State | Since 1910 | Rank, boys | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York | 105 | not ranked | 8.6× |
Where Berel is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Berel is most over-represented in New York: since 1952 it was given 8.6 times as often there as its national share each year would predict.
States: SSA state file, 1910-2025, published May 8, 2026; births count girls and boys together, and the rank is among boys’ names in the state in 2025. The file leaves out any state and year with fewer than 5 babies of the name, so small states are undercounted; each ratio compares the state’s births of Berel with the births its national share predicts year by year, for states with at least 100 births of the name.
Names spelled alike
Of these 3 names spelled alike, given to 1,472 babies since 1880, Berel is the second most given (13% of them). In 2025 it was given to 13 of their 29 babies (45%), again the second most given.
Spelled alike: names in the SSA national file with the same pattern of letters and sounds and at most two letters apart, and Wiktionary’s listed forms; births since 1880 and in 2025, and each name’s peak year, from the SSA national file, published May 8, 2026. Some are separate names, not spellings of one.
Names that rose and fell in the same decades as Berel
Names whose births rose and fell across the same decades, measured on each decade’s share of births.
Similar histories: each decade’s share of births, from the SSA national file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
More about Berel and names like it
- Compare Berel and BerlBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sBerel peaked in 2016.
- New York’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Berel since 1910.
- The top names of 2016The year the most babies were named Berel.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Berel alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with BMost given first.