Canon
Canon was given to 64 boys in 2025, #2,211 among boys’ names; 2,792 Americans have been recorded with it since 1971 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 2,760 Americans named Canon and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 14 years old and half are between 8 and 20.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Canon by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Canon?
#2,211 among boys’ names, 2025
Canon fell from #1,768 in 2015 to #2,211 in 2025 among boys’ names; its share of boys born fell from 44.9 to 37.5 per million.
129 babies in 2019, the peak
Canon peaked in 2019, when 129 boys were given it, #1,383 among boys’ names. The 69 births of 2025 (girls and boys) are 53% of that peak.
Births by sex.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 64 | #2,211 | 37.5 |
| 2024 | 82 | #1,923 | 47.6 |
| 2023 | 86 | #1,853 | 50.3 |
| 2022 | 112 | #1,577 | 64.1 |
| 2021 | 98 | #1,678 | 56.0 |
| 2020 | 114 | #1,491 | 66.0 |
| 2019 | 129 | #1,383 | 71.9 |
| 2018 | 115 | #1,499 | 63.3 |
| 2017 | 113 | #1,489 | 61.0 |
| 2016 | 89 | #1,743 | 46.9 |
Every recorded year (47)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 86 | #1,768 | 44.9 |
| 2014 | 127 | #1,349 | 66.1 |
| 2013 | 100 | #1,563 | 52.9 |
| 2012 | 117 | #1,420 | 61.7 |
| 2011 | 120 | #1,386 | 63.2 |
| 2010 | 108 | #1,504 | 56.3 |
| 2009 | 106 | #1,546 | 53.4 |
| 2008 | 109 | #1,496 | 53.4 |
| 2007 | 99 | #1,580 | 47.7 |
| 2006 | 104 | #1,469 | 50.6 |
| 2005 | 87 | #1,584 | 43.6 |
| 2004 | 79 | #1,629 | 39.8 |
| 2003 | 79 | #1,593 | 40.0 |
| 2002 | 61 | #1,848 | 31.4 |
| 2001 | 36 | #2,621 | 18.5 |
| 2000 | 50 | #2,015 | 25.5 |
| 1999 | 38 | #2,353 | 19.8 |
| 1998 | 29 | #2,793 | 15.2 |
| 1997 | 41 | #2,132 | 21.7 |
| 1996 | 25 | #2,931 | 13.2 |
| 1995 | 23 | #3,030 | 12.1 |
| 1994 | 10 | #5,497 | 5.2 |
| 1993 | 15 | #4,038 | 7.6 |
| 1992 | 11 | #4,910 | 5.5 |
| 1991 | 7 | #6,601 | 3.5 |
| 1990 | 7 | #6,494 | 3.4 |
| 1989 | 7 | #6,302 | 3.5 |
| 1988 | 8 | #5,255 | 4.2 |
| 1987 | 7 | #5,557 | 3.7 |
| 1986 | 6 | #6,031 | 3.3 |
| 1985 | 9 | #4,371 | 4.9 |
| 1984 | 6 | #5,662 | 3.3 |
| 1983 | 7 | #4,992 | 3.9 |
| 1982 | 5 | #6,496 | 2.8 |
| 1981 | 6 | #5,593 | 3.3 |
| 1978 | 6 | #5,140 | 3.7 |
| 1971 | 8 | #3,700 | 4.5 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Canon a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 2,792 Americans recorded as Canon, 1% are girls and 99% boys. In 2025 it went to 5 girls and 64 boys.
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Canon: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Canon, and how old are they?
2,760 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 2,792 Americans ever recorded as Canon. The median Canon alive today is 14 years old; half are between 8 and 20.
The 2020 Census counted 2,155 people named Canon (86 women and girls, 2,069 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 2,235 born in the U.S. The Census count is 4% below that prediction.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Generation X | 1965-1980 | 13 |
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 163 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 1,260 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 1,320 |
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 Canon born?
The states with the most babies named Canon are Texas, California and Alabama, with 100% of its births recorded by state in 2025; Alabama is not among the ten states with the most births.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank, boys | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| Texas | 10 | #1,670 | 1.3× |
| California | 6 | #2,248 | 0.6× |
| Alabama | 5 | #782 | 0.3× |
Where Canon is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Canon is most over-represented in Texas: since 1971 it was given 1.3 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 Canon with the births its national share predicts year by year, for states with at least 100 births of the name.
How common is the spelling Canon?
Canon is a less common spelling of Cannon: SSA has recorded 2,792 Canon and 11,207 Cannon since 1880.
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 41,569 babies since 1880, Canon is the sixth most given (6.7% of them). In 2025 it was given to 69 of their 1,464 babies (4.7%), the seventh most given that year.
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 Canon
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 Canon and names like it
- Compare Canon and CannonBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sCanon peaked in 2019.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Canon since 1910.
- The top names of 2019The year the most babies were named Canon.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Canon alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with CMost given first.