Promise
Promise was given to 330 girls in 2025, #826 among girls’ names; 6,838 Americans have been recorded with it since 1975 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 6,780 Americans named Promise and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 10 years old and half are between 5 and 18.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Promise by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Promise mean?
Wiktionary, English section
Promise is “a female given name from English.”
Meaning: Wiktionary, English section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Promise?
#826 among girls’ names, 2025
Promise rose from #1,071 in 2015 to #826 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born rose from 0.14 to 0.21 per 1,000.
422 babies in 2023, the peak
Promise peaked in 2023, when 422 babies were given it (395 girls, #714 among girls’ names). The 348 births of 2025 (girls and boys) are 82% of that peak.
Births by sex.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 330 | #826 | 0.21 |
| 2024 | 337 | #819 | 0.21 |
| 2023 | 395 | #714 | 0.25 |
| 2022 | 365 | #780 | 0.22 |
| 2021 | 390 | #731 | 0.24 |
| 2020 | 319 | #853 | 0.20 |
| 2019 | 320 | #844 | 0.19 |
| 2018 | 295 | #912 | 0.17 |
| 2017 | 242 | #1,063 | 0.14 |
| 2016 | 215 | #1,172 | 0.12 |
Every recorded year (51)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 246 | #1,071 | 0.14 |
| 2014 | 249 | #1,047 | 0.14 |
| 2013 | 218 | #1,118 | 0.12 |
| 2012 | 211 | #1,164 | 0.12 |
| 2011 | 217 | #1,133 | 0.12 |
| 2010 | 217 | #1,132 | 0.12 |
| 2009 | 203 | #1,230 | 0.11 |
| 2008 | 203 | #1,240 | 0.11 |
| 2007 | 179 | #1,356 | 0.09 |
| 2006 | 149 | #1,486 | 0.08 |
| 2005 | 116 | #1,714 | 0.06 |
| 2004 | 107 | #1,789 | 0.06 |
| 2003 | 98 | #1,880 | 0.05 |
| 2002 | 68 | #2,368 | 0.04 |
| 2001 | 99 | #1,801 | 0.05 |
| 2000 | 74 | #2,164 | 0.04 |
| 1999 | 61 | #2,415 | 0.03 |
| 1998 | 60 | #2,356 | 0.03 |
| 1997 | 57 | #2,352 | 0.03 |
| 1996 | 40 | #3,006 | 0.02 |
| 1995 | 45 | #2,713 | 0.03 |
| 1994 | 40 | #2,973 | 0.02 |
| 1993 | 25 | #4,207 | 0.01 |
| 1992 | 20 | #4,985 | 0.01 |
| 1991 | 12 | #7,279 | 0.01 |
| 1990 | 12 | #7,177 | 0.01 |
| 1989 | 10 | #7,868 | 0.01 |
| 1988 | 16 | #5,240 | 0.01 |
| 1987 | 21 | #4,090 | 0.01 |
| 1986 | 10 | #6,976 | 0.01 |
| 1985 | 23 | #3,702 | 0.01 |
| 1984 | 10 | #6,637 | 0.01 |
| 1983 | 17 | #4,416 | 0.01 |
| 1982 | 10 | #6,717 | 0.01 |
| 1981 | 15 | #4,892 | 0.01 |
| 1980 | 11 | #6,205 | 0.01 |
| 1979 | 10 | #6,556 | 0.01 |
| 1978 | 10 | #6,265 | 0.01 |
| 1977 | 15 | #4,581 | 0.01 |
| 1976 | 9 | #6,431 | 0.01 |
| 1975 | 5 | #10,160 | under 0.01 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Promise a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 6,838 Americans recorded as Promise, 94% are girls and 6% boys. In 2025 it went to 330 girls and 18 boys.
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Promise: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Promise, and how old are they?
6,780 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 6,838 Americans ever recorded as Promise. The median Promise alive today is 10 years old; half are between 5 and 18.
The 2020 Census counted 3,857 people named Promise (3,436 women and girls, 421 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 4,603 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.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Generation X | 1965-1980 | 57 |
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 327 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 2,230 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 4,160 |
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 Promise born?
The states with the most babies named Promise are Florida, Georgia and Texas, with 31% of its births recorded by state in 2025.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank, girls | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| Florida | 35 | #527 | 1.2× |
| Georgia | 34 | #317 | 2.1× |
| Texas | 24 | #1,149 | 0.7× |
| New York | 21 | #782 | 0.6× |
| California | 19 | #1,310 | 0.5× |
| South Carolina | 18 | #287 | 1.8× |
| Illinois | 16 | #615 | 0.7× |
| Virginia | 14 | #562 | 1.0× |
| Louisiana | 12 | #391 | 0.8× |
| North Carolina | 11 | #890 | 1.3× |
Where Promise is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Promise is most over-represented in Georgia: since 1975 it was given 2.1 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 Promise 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 2 names spelled alike, given to 7,466 babies since 1880, Promise is the most given (92% of them). In 2025 it was given to 348 of their 392 babies (89%), 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 Promise
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 Promise and names like it
- Compare Promise and PromyseBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2020sPromise peaked in 2023.
- Georgia’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Promise since 1910.
- English namesWiktionary’s origin for Promise: every such name, by how often it is given.
- The top names of 2023The year the most babies were named Promise.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Promise alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with PMost given first.