Thorn
Thorn was given to 10 boys in 2025, #8,185 among boys’ names; 313 Americans have been recorded with it since 1958 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Thorn by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Thorn?
#8,185 among boys’ names, 2025
Thorn rose from #10,513 in 2015 to #8,185 in 2025 among boys’ names; its share of boys born rose from 3.7 to 5.9 per million.
16 babies in 1988, the peak
Thorn peaked in 1988, when 16 boys were given it, #3,328 among boys’ names. The 10 births of 2025 are 63% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 10 | #8,185 | 5.9 |
| 2024 | 5 | #14,037 | 2.9 |
| 2023 | 8 | #9,650 | 4.7 |
| 2022 | 5 | #14,118 | 2.9 |
| 2021 | 7 | #10,684 | 4.0 |
| 2020 | 8 | #9,468 | 4.6 |
| 2019 | 8 | #9,646 | 4.5 |
| 2018 | 8 | #9,569 | 4.4 |
| 2017 | 7 | #10,656 | 3.8 |
| 2016 | 9 | #8,733 | 4.7 |
Every recorded year (39)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 7 | #10,513 | 3.7 |
| 2014 | 6 | #11,957 | 3.1 |
| 2013 | 5 | #13,855 | 2.6 |
| 2012 | 6 | #12,132 | 3.2 |
| 2011 | 5 | #14,136 | 2.6 |
| 2009 | 8 | #9,765 | 4.0 |
| 2008 | 6 | #12,389 | 2.9 |
| 2007 | 10 | #8,101 | 4.8 |
| 2006 | 6 | #11,912 | 2.9 |
| 2005 | 11 | #7,048 | 5.5 |
| 2004 | 10 | #7,465 | 5.0 |
| 2003 | 6 | #10,744 | 3.0 |
| 2000 | 5 | #11,964 | 2.5 |
| 1999 | 7 | #8,619 | 3.6 |
| 1998 | 12 | #5,425 | 6.3 |
| 1997 | 8 | #7,207 | 4.2 |
| 1996 | 8 | #7,057 | 4.2 |
| 1995 | 10 | #5,874 | 5.3 |
| 1994 | 8 | #6,912 | 4.1 |
| 1993 | 13 | #4,664 | 6.6 |
| 1992 | 9 | #6,080 | 4.5 |
| 1991 | 14 | #4,198 | 6.9 |
| 1990 | 9 | #5,762 | 4.4 |
| 1989 | 11 | #4,781 | 5.5 |
| 1988 | 16 | #3,328 | 8.4 |
| 1987 | 7 | #6,025 | 3.7 |
| 1985 | 5 | #7,488 | 2.7 |
| 1962 | 5 | #4,580 | 2.4 |
| 1958 | 5 | #4,460 | 2.4 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Thorn a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Thorn has been recorded only for boys: SSA lists no girls with the name in 39 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Thorn: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Thorn, and how old are they?
An estimated 303 Americans named Thorn and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (97% of everyone recorded); the median is 22 years old and half are between 11 and 33. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 406 people named Thorn (48 women and girls, 358 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 265 born in the U.S. The Census count is 1.5 times that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census records the name people give, which for many is the short form Thorn 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 4 names spelled alike, given to 3,047 babies since 1880, Thorn is the third most given (10% of them). In 2025 it was given to 10 of their 194 babies (5.2%), 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 Thorn
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 Thorn and names like it
- Compare Thorn and ThorinBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 1980sThorn peaked in 1988.
- The top names of 1988The year the most babies were named Thorn.
- The names of the MillennialsMost people named Thorn alive today were born 1981-1996.
- Names starting with TMost given first.