Lion
Lion was given to 37 boys in 2025, #3,218 among boys’ names; 448 Americans have been recorded with it since 1922 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Lion by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Lion?
#3,218 among boys’ names, 2025
Lion rose from #4,243 in 2015 to #3,218 in 2025 among boys’ names; its share of boys born rose from 12.5 to 21.7 per million.
43 babies in 2022, the peak
Lion peaked in 2022, when 43 boys were given it, #2,938 among boys’ names. The 37 births of 2025 are 86% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 37 | #3,218 | 21.7 |
| 2024 | 31 | #3,654 | 18.0 |
| 2023 | 41 | #3,037 | 24.0 |
| 2022 | 43 | #2,938 | 24.6 |
| 2021 | 24 | #4,318 | 13.7 |
| 2020 | 23 | #4,359 | 13.3 |
| 2019 | 32 | #3,531 | 17.8 |
| 2018 | 28 | #3,841 | 15.4 |
| 2017 | 29 | #3,729 | 15.7 |
| 2016 | 18 | #5,238 | 9.5 |
Every recorded year (25)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 24 | #4,243 | 12.5 |
| 2014 | 18 | #5,175 | 9.4 |
| 2013 | 13 | #6,477 | 6.9 |
| 2012 | 8 | #9,371 | 4.2 |
| 2011 | 8 | #9,273 | 4.2 |
| 2010 | 10 | #7,920 | 5.2 |
| 2009 | 5 | #13,689 | 2.5 |
| 2008 | 14 | #6,274 | 6.9 |
| 2007 | 5 | #13,599 | 2.4 |
| 2005 | 8 | #8,780 | 4.0 |
| 1999 | 5 | #10,926 | 2.6 |
| 1995 | 5 | #9,728 | 2.6 |
| 1994 | 7 | #7,441 | 3.6 |
| 1993 | 6 | #8,263 | 3.1 |
| 1922 | 6 | #4,115 | 5.5 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Lion a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Lion has been recorded only for boys: SSA lists no girls with the name in 25 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Lion: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Lion, and how old are they?
An estimated 438 Americans named Lion and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (98% of everyone recorded); the median is 7 years old and half are between 4 and 12. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 514 people named Lion (30 women and girls, 484 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 247 born in the U.S. The Census count is 2.1 times that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census records the name people give, which for many is the short form Lion 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 6 names spelled alike, given to 10,246 babies since 1880, Lion is the fifth most given (4.4% of them). In 2025 it was given to 37 of their 958 babies (3.9%), the fourth 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 Lion
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 Lion and names like it
- Compare Lion and LianBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2020sLion peaked in 2022.
- California’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Lion since 1910.
- The top names of 2022The year the most babies were named Lion.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Lion alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with LMost given first.