Brooklyn
Brooklyn was given to 2,300 girls in 2025, #118 among girls’ names; 127,055 Americans have been recorded with it since 1972 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 126,000 Americans named Brooklyn and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 14 years old and half are between 9 and 19.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Brooklyn by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Brooklyn mean?
Wiktionary, English section
Brooklyn is “a female given name transferred from the place name, of modern usage; variant form Brooklynn.” Its etymology gives the sense “wetland, marsh” (broek).
Also “a unisex given name transferred from the place name, of modern usage.”
From Dutch Breukelen, from broek (“wetland, marsh”).
/ˈbɹʊk.lən/
Meaning: Wiktionary, English section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Brooklyn?
#118 among girls’ names, 2025
Brooklyn fell from #31 in 2015 to #118 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 3.5 to 1.4 per 1,000.
7,257 babies in 2011, the peak
Brooklyn peaked in 2011, when 7,257 babies were given it (7,178 girls, #21 among girls’ names). The 2,337 births of 2025 (girls and boys) are 32% of that peak.
Births by sex.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 2,300 | #118 | 1.4 |
| 2024 | 2,500 | #107 | 1.5 |
| 2023 | 2,865 | #84 | 1.8 |
| 2022 | 3,216 | #72 | 2.0 |
| 2021 | 3,545 | #63 | 2.2 |
| 2020 | 4,032 | #54 | 2.5 |
| 2019 | 4,316 | #52 | 2.6 |
| 2018 | 4,652 | #47 | 2.7 |
| 2017 | 5,213 | #39 | 3.0 |
| 2016 | 5,971 | #34 | 3.4 |
Every recorded year (54)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 6,333 | #31 | 3.5 |
| 2014 | 6,842 | #26 | 3.8 |
| 2013 | 6,906 | #28 | 3.9 |
| 2012 | 6,796 | #29 | 3.9 |
| 2011 | 7,178 | #21 | 4.1 |
| 2010 | 6,130 | #34 | 3.4 |
| 2009 | 5,677 | #37 | 3.1 |
| 2008 | 5,317 | #48 | 2.8 |
| 2007 | 4,887 | #57 | 2.5 |
| 2006 | 4,719 | #66 | 2.5 |
| 2005 | 4,132 | #78 | 2.2 |
| 2004 | 3,266 | #101 | 1.8 |
| 2003 | 2,925 | #118 | 1.6 |
| 2002 | 2,210 | #152 | 1.2 |
| 2001 | 1,905 | #172 | 1.1 |
| 2000 | 1,831 | #177 | 1.0 |
| 1999 | 1,689 | #182 | 1.0 |
| 1998 | 1,558 | #200 | 0.88 |
| 1997 | 1,328 | #227 | 0.76 |
| 1996 | 1,010 | #286 | 0.58 |
| 1995 | 774 | #341 | 0.44 |
| 1994 | 658 | #385 | 0.37 |
| 1993 | 541 | #467 | 0.30 |
| 1992 | 426 | #553 | 0.23 |
| 1991 | 294 | #716 | 0.16 |
| 1990 | 210 | #909 | 0.11 |
| 1989 | 164 | #1,040 | 0.09 |
| 1988 | 139 | #1,112 | 0.08 |
| 1987 | 100 | #1,364 | 0.06 |
| 1986 | 90 | #1,422 | 0.05 |
| 1985 | 74 | #1,604 | 0.04 |
| 1984 | 69 | #1,605 | 0.04 |
| 1983 | 78 | #1,476 | 0.05 |
| 1982 | 71 | #1,622 | 0.04 |
| 1981 | 60 | #1,831 | 0.04 |
| 1980 | 53 | #1,983 | 0.03 |
| 1979 | 45 | #2,189 | 0.03 |
| 1978 | 32 | #2,636 | 0.02 |
| 1977 | 26 | #3,009 | 0.02 |
| 1976 | 11 | #5,245 | 0.01 |
| 1975 | 12 | #4,888 | 0.01 |
| 1974 | 8 | #6,319 | 0.01 |
| 1973 | 7 | #6,745 | under 0.01 |
| 1972 | 6 | #7,370 | under 0.01 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Brooklyn a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 127,055 Americans recorded as Brooklyn, 99% are girls and 1% boys. In 2025 it went to 2,300 girls and 37 boys.
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Brooklyn: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Brooklyn, and how old are they?
126,000 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 127,055 Americans ever recorded as Brooklyn. The median Brooklyn alive today is 14 years old; half are between 9 and 19.
The 2020 Census counted 96,523 people named Brooklyn (95,196 women and girls, 1,327 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 108,463 born in the U.S. The Census count is 11% below that prediction. Possible reasons: people who give a short form or another name to the Census, and a survival estimate that can run high.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Generation X | 1965-1980 | 195 |
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 4,760 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 61,900 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 59,100 |
An estimate, not a count. SSA’s files count people born in the United States who received a Social Security number, so anyone born abroad is not in them; before 1937 most people got a number as adults, and their survival is counted from that age.
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 Brooklyn born?
The states with the most babies named Brooklyn are Texas, California and Florida, with 24% of its births recorded by state in 2025.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank, girls | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| Texas | 206 | #156 | 0.8× |
| California | 206 | #156 | 0.7× |
| Florida | 129 | #138 | 0.6× |
| Georgia | 89 | #98 | 1.0× |
| Ohio | 85 | #128 | 1.3× |
| North Carolina | 85 | #117 | 0.9× |
| Michigan | 84 | #87 | 1.4× |
| Illinois | 84 | #108 | 0.9× |
| Pennsylvania | 74 | #146 | 0.7× |
| Virginia | 70 | #101 | 0.8× |
Where Brooklyn is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Brooklyn is most over-represented in Utah: since 1972 it was given 2.0 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 girls’ 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 Brooklyn 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 8 names spelled alike, given to 174,702 babies since 1880, Brooklyn is the most given (73% of them). In 2025 it was given to 2,337 of their 2,993 babies (78%), again the 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 Brooklyn
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 Brooklyn and names like it
- Compare Brooklyn and BrooklynnBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sBrooklyn peaked in 2011.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Brooklyn since 1910.
- From place namesWiktionary’s origin for Brooklyn: every such name, by how often it is given.
- The top names of 2011The year the most babies were named Brooklyn.
- The names of Generation ZMost people named Brooklyn alive today were born 1997-2012.
- Names starting with BMost given first.