Kinley
Kinley was given to 409 girls in 2025, #692 among girls’ names; 20,313 Americans have been recorded with it since 1917 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 20,100 Americans named Kinley and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 12 years old and half are between 8 and 15.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Kinley by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Kinley mean?
Wiktionary, English section
Kinley is “a female given name transferred from the surname.”
Shortened from McKinley.
Meaning: Wiktionary, English section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Kinley?
#692 among girls’ names, 2025
Kinley fell from #235 in 2015 to #692 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 0.79 to 0.25 per 1,000.
1,769 babies in 2012, the peak
Kinley peaked in 2012, when 1,769 babies were given it (1,750 girls, #180 among girls’ names). The 409 births of 2025 are 23% of that peak.
Births by sex.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 409 | #692 | 0.25 |
| 2024 | 485 | #618 | 0.30 |
| 2023 | 500 | #597 | 0.31 |
| 2022 | 593 | #526 | 0.36 |
| 2021 | 617 | #505 | 0.38 |
| 2020 | 707 | #434 | 0.44 |
| 2019 | 770 | #407 | 0.46 |
| 2018 | 984 | #331 | 0.58 |
| 2017 | 1,019 | #322 | 0.59 |
| 2016 | 1,248 | #254 | 0.70 |
Every recorded year (42)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 1,408 | #235 | 0.79 |
| 2014 | 1,619 | #209 | 0.91 |
| 2013 | 1,560 | #208 | 0.89 |
| 2012 | 1,750 | #180 | 1.0 |
| 2011 | 1,641 | #195 | 0.93 |
| 2010 | 1,352 | #232 | 0.76 |
| 2009 | 688 | #453 | 0.37 |
| 2008 | 462 | #666 | 0.24 |
| 2007 | 325 | #863 | 0.17 |
| 2006 | 292 | #908 | 0.15 |
| 2005 | 241 | #1,012 | 0.13 |
| 2004 | 233 | #1,014 | 0.13 |
| 2003 | 203 | #1,087 | 0.11 |
| 2002 | 163 | #1,233 | 0.09 |
| 2001 | 162 | #1,239 | 0.09 |
| 2000 | 128 | #1,438 | 0.07 |
| 1999 | 122 | #1,437 | 0.07 |
| 1998 | 87 | #1,791 | 0.05 |
| 1997 | 53 | #2,461 | 0.03 |
| 1996 | 19 | #5,179 | 0.01 |
| 1995 | 19 | #5,126 | 0.01 |
| 1994 | 11 | #7,886 | 0.01 |
| 1993 | 9 | #9,131 | under 0.01 |
| 1992 | 17 | #5,595 | 0.01 |
| 1991 | 8 | #9,782 | under 0.01 |
| 1990 | 8 | #9,714 | under 0.01 |
| 1989 | 8 | #9,178 | under 0.01 |
| 1988 | 11 | #6,872 | 0.01 |
| 1987 | 7 | #9,281 | under 0.01 |
| 1986 | 7 | #9,027 | under 0.01 |
| 1985 | 9 | #7,251 | 0.01 |
| 1979 | 5 | #11,000 | under 0.01 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Kinley a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 20,313 Americans recorded as Kinley, 98% are girls and 2% boys. In 2025 it went to 409 girls; SSA lists no boys with it that year (fewer than 5, or none).
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Kinley: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Kinley, and how old are they?
20,100 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 20,313 Americans ever recorded as Kinley. The median Kinley alive today is 12 years old; half are between 8 and 15.
The 2020 Census counted 15,841 people named Kinley (15,448 women and girls, 393 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 17,012 born in the U.S. The Census count is 7% below that prediction.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Baby Boomers | 1946-1964 | 25 |
| Generation X | 1965-1980 | 17 |
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 160 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 7,990 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 11,900 |
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 Kinley born?
The states with the most babies named Kinley are Texas, Indiana and Missouri, with 21% of its births recorded by state in 2025; Indiana and Missouri are not among the ten states with the most births.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank, girls | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| Texas | 34 | #870 | 1.1× |
| Indiana | 23 | #312 | 1.7× |
| Missouri | 22 | #284 | 1.9× |
| Georgia | 18 | #597 | 0.9× |
| Florida | 17 | #938 | 0.8× |
| Ohio | 17 | #606 | 1.0× |
| Tennessee | 16 | #490 | 1.4× |
| California | 16 | #1,447 | 0.3× |
| North Carolina | 14 | #711 | 1.2× |
| Pennsylvania | 14 | #708 | 0.6× |
Where Kinley is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Kinley is most over-represented in Arkansas: since 1917 it was given 2.5 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 girls’ 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 Kinley with the births its national share predicts year by year, for states with at least 100 births of the name.
Names spelled alike
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 30,559 babies since 1880, Kinley is the most given (66% of them). In 2025 it was given to 409 of their 666 babies (61%), again the most given.
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 Kinley
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 Kinley and names like it
- Compare Kinley and KynleeBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sKinley peaked in 2012.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Kinley since 1910.
- From surnamesWiktionary’s origin for Kinley: every such name, by how often it is given.
- The top names of 2012The year the most babies were named Kinley.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Kinley alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with KMost given first.