Ling — #12441 US unisex name

What the Data Says About Ling

The Social Security Administration has registered 197 babies named Ling between 1977 and 2024, spanning 48 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a girl's name, Ling currently holds the #12441 rank among girls for 2024. The name reached its historical peak in 1981, when 13 babies received it in a single year. Ling is classified as unisex in SSA records: the opposite-sex variant accounts for 18 additional births since 1982.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Ling performed strongest in the 1980s, accumulating 75 births during that ten-year window. Across the 6 decades of recorded activity, Ling shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in California, which accounts for 26 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by New York. In total, SSA state-level files list Ling in 2 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Ling 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 197 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.