How Many Karens Are Left?
The internet pictures Karen as a 45-year-old at a returns counter. The data says she is closer to 65 — and there are almost no new ones.
Journal
Namecalling
Charts and notes on American naming culture, data, and the names that shape generations.
Eithan and Ailany Aren't New Names
Eithan and Ailany are 2025's fastest-rising names. Both are respellings of sounds America already had, arriving by the spelling instead of the name.
The Glaciers — Names That Took a Generation to Rise and Fell Just as Slowly
84 names climbed to enormous peaks over 25+ years and declined for just as long.
The Flash Floods of American Naming
175 names surged from nowhere to a peak and collapsed within five years. These are the flash floods of American naming.
The Names That Arrived All at Once
Every year has a baby name that appears from nowhere with the largest first-year count. Together they form a century of American media and migration.
Press Start to Name
Forty years of video games leaked onto real American birth certificates, often the exact year a game shipped.
How America Stopped Sharing Names
We abandoned our most popular names, quietly converged on a few sounds, then manufactured uniqueness by respelling them.
Baby Name Trends Don't Start on the Coasts
The intuition is that names start in New York and Los Angeles and spread inward. The state data says the opposite: trends ignite in Wyoming, Utah, and the Dakotas, and the big coastal states are the last to arrive.
The Map Hidden in America's Birth Certificates
Compare every baby name's popularity in each state to the nation and a hidden map appears: football stadiums in Iowa and Tennessee, Somali and Amish communities, a language of its own in Hawaii, and an entire naming ecosystem in Utah.
The Jessica Extinction Event
In 1987, Jessica, Ashley, and Amanda accounted for 152,634 girls. In 2025, the same three names accounted for 2,854.
One-Hit Wonder Names
Kunta in 1977. Arsenio in 1989. Moesha in 1996. Names that appeared out of nowhere, peaked, and vanished — the one-hit wonders of 145 years of SSA data.
Your Mom's Name Is Endangered
In 1947, 99,692 babies were named Linda: one in fifteen American girls, the most successful name in 145 years of records. In 2025, the count was 294.
The Great Vintage Revival
The name Theodore peaked in 1920 at 3,219 births, a record that held for 105 years. In 2025, 13,355 babies broke it.
Mateo and Maverick Want the Same Thing
Two trends in the 2025 SSA data look like opposites: Mateo, Thiago, Luna, and Valentina on one side, Maverick and its kin on the other.
The Kehlani Effect
Most pop-culture names show up loud and disappear before kindergarten. Kehlani is in a different category.
Baby Names That Vanished From America
The most surprising data in the SSA archive isn't the unusual names. It's how fast a normal name can disappear.
What Your Birth Year Name Says About You
Your birth year has a sound. Class rosters carried it before you knew it was there.
Grandparent Names Are Coming Back
A comeback name has to be old enough that it isn't still attached to someone's parents, but not so old that it sounds like a museum label.