Cay
Cay was last recorded in 1966, when 5 babies were given it; 252 Americans have been recorded with it between 1919 and 1966 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Cay by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Cay?
Unranked in 2025
Its last girls’ rank on record is #6,696, in 1966; SSA lists a name only in years with 5 or more births.
38 babies in 1955, the peak
Cay peaked in 1955, when 38 girls were given it, #1,669 among girls’ names. It was not recorded in 2025.
Births by sex.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1966 | 5 | #6,696 | 3.0 |
| 1965 | 7 | #5,353 | 4.0 |
| 1963 | 10 | #4,297 | 5.2 |
| 1962 | 8 | #4,920 | 4.1 |
| 1961 | 8 | #4,946 | 4.0 |
| 1960 | 19 | #2,826 | 9.4 |
| 1959 | 14 | #3,278 | 6.9 |
| 1958 | 12 | #3,569 | 6.0 |
| 1957 | 12 | #3,506 | 5.9 |
| 1956 | 23 | #2,327 | 11.5 |
Every recorded year (20)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1955 | 38 | #1,669 | 19.4 |
| 1954 | 23 | #2,246 | 11.8 |
| 1953 | 6 | #5,120 | 3.2 |
| 1952 | 8 | #4,176 | 4.3 |
| 1950 | 7 | #4,374 | 4.1 |
| 1948 | 9 | #3,629 | 5.3 |
| 1946 | 7 | #4,045 | 4.5 |
| 1945 | 6 | #4,091 | 4.6 |
| 1943 | 12 | #2,722 | 8.6 |
| 1939 | 7 | #3,480 | 6.4 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Cay a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 252 Americans recorded as Cay, 96% are girls and 4% boys.
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Cay: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Cay, and how old are they?
An estimated 185 Americans named Cay and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (73% of everyone recorded); the median is 70 years old and half are between 66 and 72. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 511 people named Cay (430 women and girls, 81 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 202 born in the U.S. The Census count is 2.5 times that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census records the name people give, which for many is the short form Cay rather than the name on their birth record, and it counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out.
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).
Names spelled alike
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 137,392 babies since 1880, Cay is the eighth most given (<1% of them). In 2025 none of their 385 babies recorded by SSA was a Cay (SSA lists a name only with 5 or more babies of one sex).
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 Cay
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 Cay and names like it
- Compare Cay and KayBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 1950sCay peaked in 1955.
- The top names of 1955The year the most babies were named Cay.
- The names of the Baby BoomersMost people named Cay alive today were born 1946-1964.
- Names starting with CMost given first.