Carl — #1032 US boys' name

What the Data Says About Carl

The Social Security Administration has registered 504,635 babies named Carl between 1880 and 2024, spanning 145 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Carl currently holds the #1032 rank among boys for 2024. The name reached its historical peak in 1956, when 8,314 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Carl performed strongest in the 1950s, accumulating 78,754 births during that ten-year window. Across the 15 decades of recorded activity, Carl shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in Pennsylvania, which accounts for 35,865 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by New York and Ohio. In total, SSA state-level files list Carl in 51 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Carl 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 504,635 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.