Modesty
Modesty was given to 12 girls in 2025, #8,699 among girls’ names; 583 Americans have been recorded with it since 1960 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Modesty by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Modesty?
#8,699 among girls’ names, 2025
Modesty fell from #8,293 in 2015 to #8,699 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 7.8 to 7.5 per million.
25 babies in 2019, the peak
Modesty peaked in 2019, when 25 girls were given it, #5,262 among girls’ names. The 12 births of 2025 are 48% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 12 | #8,699 | 7.5 |
| 2024 | 12 | #8,783 | 7.4 |
| 2023 | 7 | #13,035 | 4.4 |
| 2022 | 6 | #14,754 | 3.7 |
| 2021 | 19 | #6,328 | 11.6 |
| 2020 | 16 | #7,119 | 9.9 |
| 2019 | 25 | #5,262 | 14.9 |
| 2018 | 18 | #6,703 | 10.6 |
| 2017 | 22 | #5,764 | 12.7 |
| 2016 | 15 | #7,870 | 8.5 |
Every recorded year (41)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 14 | #8,293 | 7.8 |
| 2014 | 15 | #7,948 | 8.4 |
| 2013 | 16 | #7,639 | 9.1 |
| 2012 | 20 | #6,504 | 11.4 |
| 2011 | 9 | #11,859 | 5.1 |
| 2010 | 13 | #9,074 | 7.3 |
| 2009 | 17 | #7,575 | 9.3 |
| 2008 | 16 | #7,993 | 8.5 |
| 2007 | 20 | #6,735 | 10.4 |
| 2006 | 22 | #6,064 | 11.6 |
| 2005 | 11 | #9,917 | 6.0 |
| 2004 | 16 | #7,286 | 8.7 |
| 2003 | 12 | #8,891 | 6.6 |
| 2002 | 20 | #5,829 | 11.1 |
| 2001 | 24 | #4,950 | 13.3 |
| 2000 | 21 | #5,437 | 11.6 |
| 1999 | 12 | #8,050 | 6.8 |
| 1998 | 11 | #8,383 | 6.2 |
| 1997 | 22 | #4,764 | 12.6 |
| 1996 | 15 | #6,270 | 8.6 |
| 1995 | 23 | #4,450 | 13.1 |
| 1994 | 6 | #12,870 | 3.4 |
| 1993 | 9 | #9,251 | 5.0 |
| 1992 | 5 | #14,741 | 2.7 |
| 1990 | 10 | #8,296 | 5.3 |
| 1989 | 6 | #11,826 | 3.3 |
| 1983 | 16 | #4,613 | 9.6 |
| 1982 | 13 | #5,425 | 7.7 |
| 1972 | 7 | #7,029 | 4.6 |
| 1970 | 5 | #8,867 | 2.9 |
| 1960 | 5 | #7,018 | 2.5 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Modesty a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Modesty has been recorded only for girls: SSA lists no boys with the name in 41 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Modesty: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Modesty, and how old are they?
An estimated 575 Americans named Modesty and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 19 years old and half are between 10 and 28. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 427 people named Modesty (422 women and girls, 5 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 509 born in the U.S. The Census count is 16% below that prediction. Possible reasons: people who give a short form or another name to the Census, and a survival estimate that can run high.
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 2 names spelled alike, given to 2,198 babies since 1880, Modesty is the second most given (27% of them).
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 Modesty
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 Modesty and names like it
- Compare Modesty and ModestaBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sModesty peaked in 2019.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Modesty since 1910.
- The top names of 2019The year the most babies were named Modesty.
- The names of Generation ZMost people named Modesty alive today were born 1997-2012.
- Names starting with MMost given first.