Red
Red was given to 15 boys in 2025, #6,072 among boys’ names; 396 Americans have been recorded with it since 1888 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Red by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Red?
#6,072 among boys’ names, 2025
Red rose from #10,379 in 2015 to #6,072 in 2025 among boys’ names; its share of boys born rose from 3.7 to 8.8 per million.
18 babies in 2024, the peak
Red peaked in 2024, when 18 boys were given it, #5,391 among boys’ names. The 15 births of 2025 are 83% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 15 | #6,072 | 8.8 |
| 2024 | 18 | #5,391 | 10.4 |
| 2023 | 16 | #5,861 | 9.4 |
| 2022 | 16 | #5,808 | 9.2 |
| 2021 | 9 | #8,677 | 5.1 |
| 2020 | 9 | #8,575 | 5.2 |
| 2019 | 10 | #8,075 | 5.6 |
| 2018 | 10 | #8,027 | 5.5 |
| 2017 | 10 | #8,004 | 5.4 |
| 2016 | 11 | #7,494 | 5.8 |
Every recorded year (44)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 7 | #10,379 | 3.7 |
| 2014 | 11 | #7,440 | 5.7 |
| 2013 | 5 | #13,626 | 2.6 |
| 2009 | 6 | #12,143 | 3.0 |
| 2007 | 5 | #13,941 | 2.4 |
| 2001 | 5 | #11,904 | 2.6 |
| 1963 | 5 | #4,494 | 2.5 |
| 1952 | 5 | #4,141 | 2.6 |
| 1950 | 5 | #4,090 | 2.8 |
| 1934 | 5 | #4,102 | 4.8 |
| 1933 | 6 | #3,558 | 6.1 |
| 1932 | 7 | #3,305 | 6.7 |
| 1931 | 5 | #4,212 | 4.8 |
| 1929 | 5 | #4,429 | 4.6 |
| 1928 | 13 | #2,364 | 11.7 |
| 1927 | 11 | #2,670 | 9.8 |
| 1926 | 8 | #3,321 | 7.2 |
| 1925 | 16 | #2,065 | 14.3 |
| 1924 | 7 | #3,784 | 6.2 |
| 1923 | 12 | #2,577 | 10.9 |
| 1922 | 9 | #3,192 | 8.3 |
| 1920 | 12 | #2,575 | 11.3 |
| 1919 | 13 | #2,363 | 13.3 |
| 1918 | 7 | #3,636 | 6.9 |
| 1917 | 6 | #3,888 | 6.5 |
| 1916 | 13 | #2,238 | 14.6 |
| 1915 | 15 | #1,947 | 17.7 |
| 1914 | 11 | #2,076 | 16.8 |
| 1913 | 9 | #2,058 | 17.6 |
| 1911 | 5 | #1,941 | 22.1 |
| 1909 | 6 | #1,414 | 36.6 |
| 1906 | 6 | #1,219 | 45.1 |
| 1890 | 6 | #975 | 54.0 |
| 1888 | 5 | #1,151 | 41.4 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Red a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Red has been recorded only for boys: SSA lists no girls with the name in 44 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Red: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Red, and how old are they?
An estimated 174 Americans named Red and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (44% of everyone recorded); the median is 7 years old and half are between 3 and 12. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 2,003 people named Red (696 women and girls, 1,307 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 103 born in the U.S. The Census count is 19.4 times that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
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 5 names spelled alike, given to 79,602 babies since 1880, Red is the third most given (<1% of them). In 2025 it was given to 15 of their 1,996 babies (<1%), again the third 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 Red
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 Red and names like it
- Compare Red and ReidBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2020sRed peaked in 2024.
- The top names of 2024The year the most babies were named Red.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Red alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with RMost given first.