Coal
Coal was given to 7 boys in 2025, #9,898 among boys’ names; 176 Americans have been recorded with it since 1994 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Coal by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Coal?
#9,898 among boys’ names, 2025
Coal fell from #9,747 in 2015 to #9,898 in 2025 among boys’ names, although its share of boys born rose from 3.7 to 4.1 per million.
14 babies in 2016, the peak
Coal peaked in 2016, when 14 boys were given it, #6,096 among boys’ names. The 7 births of 2025 are 50% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 7 | #9,898 | 4.1 |
| 2022 | 6 | #11,126 | 3.4 |
| 2019 | 8 | #9,051 | 4.5 |
| 2017 | 13 | #6,378 | 7.0 |
| 2016 | 14 | #6,096 | 7.4 |
| 2015 | 7 | #9,747 | 3.7 |
| 2014 | 11 | #7,150 | 5.7 |
| 2013 | 11 | #7,118 | 5.8 |
| 2012 | 7 | #9,898 | 3.7 |
| 2010 | 12 | #6,753 | 6.3 |
Every recorded year (21)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 5 | #12,861 | 2.5 |
| 2007 | 9 | #8,296 | 4.3 |
| 2006 | 9 | #8,103 | 4.4 |
| 2005 | 12 | #6,288 | 6.0 |
| 2004 | 5 | #11,673 | 2.5 |
| 2003 | 6 | #9,786 | 3.0 |
| 2002 | 9 | #7,144 | 4.6 |
| 2001 | 5 | #10,868 | 2.6 |
| 2000 | 8 | #7,558 | 4.1 |
| 1999 | 6 | #8,887 | 3.1 |
| 1994 | 6 | #7,942 | 3.1 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Coal a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Coal has been recorded only for boys: SSA lists no girls with the name in 21 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Coal: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Coal, and how old are they?
An estimated 174 Americans named Coal and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 16 years old and half are between 10 and 22. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 202 people named Coal (5 women and girls, 197 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 161 born in the U.S. The Census count is 25% above that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
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 5 names spelled alike, given to 2,858 babies since 1880, Coal is the fifth most given (6.2% of them). In 2025 it was given to 7 of their 54 babies (13%), the third 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 Coal
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 Coal and names like it
- Compare Coal and KohlBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sCoal peaked in 2016.
- The top names of 2016The year the most babies were named Coal.
- The names of Generation ZMost people named Coal alive today were born 1997-2012.
- Names starting with CMost given first.