Britain’s most popular baby names - 1995 to today
Was your child named during a fad? The above graphs show the relative popularity of the ten most popular baby names over the last 12 years. There are more than 10 names in each list because, as some names have slipped out of the top 10 (to be replaced by others), the overall number we’ve tracked has grown. Some names that were hugely popular in the 90s - Rebecca, for girls - have fallen away dramatically, while others - Jack for boys - have remained stable. According to baby name experts a well-liked celebrity may well account for a name rising in popluarity - though the evidence for that is mixed. Lily Allen was about 10 when her name began to shoot up the charts. The remake of the film Alfie, starring Jude Law, meanwhile, came out in 2004. Jonah Berger, an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvannia who has studied baby names in the US, says that names definitely come in waves, but that we’re very reluctant to embrace a name once we perceive that it has become faddish, meaning it can be some 60-80 years before a name resurfaces. Which may explain the current rise of Ella - last popular around 1917, when a little girl was born in Newport News, Virginia, who would grow up to become a very famous singe
Source: ONS
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One Response to “Britain’s most popular baby names - 1995 to today”
Beautiful!
We built a similar interactive for New South Wales, Australia over at Sydney’s Powerhouse Museum. It’s hosted here if you want to have a look.
(The announcment post by project lead Seb is here.)
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