Chao — boys' name

What the Data Says About Chao

The Social Security Administration has registered 284 babies named Chao between 1971 and 2013, spanning 43 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Chao currently falls outside the top 1,000 boys' names for 2013. The name reached its historical peak in 1985, when 18 babies received it in a single year. Chao is classified as unisex in SSA records: the opposite-sex variant accounts for 36 additional births since 1983.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Chao performed strongest in the 1980s, accumulating 141 births during that ten-year window. Across the 5 decades of recorded activity, Chao shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in California, which accounts for 48 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by . In total, SSA state-level files list Chao in 1 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Chao 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 284 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.