Nils — #4876 US boys' name

What the Data Says About Nils

The Social Security Administration has registered 3,061 babies named Nils between 1888 and 2024, spanning 137 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Nils currently holds the #4876 rank among boys for 2024. The name reached its historical peak in 1970, when 48 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Nils performed strongest in the 1960s, accumulating 351 births during that ten-year window. Across the 14 decades of recorded activity, Nils shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in New York, which accounts for 264 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by California and Massachusetts. In total, SSA state-level files list Nils in 8 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Nils 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 3,061 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.