Baby

girls:

6k births since 1912

#2135 (63rd percentile)

boys:

6.3k births since 1919

#1488 (68th percentile)

overall:

12.3k births since 1912

#2372 (69th percentile)

Popularity Trends

The name Baby is the #2,372 most popular name of all time in the U.S. on a gender-neutral basis, with a total of 12,341 recorded births since 1912. This represents the 69.4% percentile of name popularity (more popular than 69.4% of all names). For boys, it ranks #1,488 (67.5% percentile) for all time with 6,295 births since 1919. For girls, it ranks #2,135 (62.6% percentile) for all time with 6,046 births since 1912.

Baby first appeared in U.S. birth records in 1912 (1912 for girls and 1919 for boys). Birth data for Baby is available in 103 out of the 112 years between 1912 and 2023 (101 years for girls and 82 years for boys). The Social Security Administration only reports birth data for years in which the name was given to at least five children of the same gender.

The name Baby is truly gender-neutral, with nearly equal distribution between boys and girls. In 2023, 53.3% of babies named Baby were boys. Interestingly, until around 1973, the name was more popular for girls (71.7% girls from 1912 to 1972), but since then it has been more commonly used for boys (52.9% boys from 1973 to 2023).

For boys, Baby reached its peak popularity in 1994, achieving the 39.2% percentile (ranked #472) with 183 births per million. The name was most common in 1994, with 183 births per million (ranked 39.2% percentile). Since reaching a low point around 2015, the popularity of this name for boys has been increasing. Currently, Baby ranks #900 for boys (1.2% percentile) with 9 births per million, which is 4.8% of its peak share of births.

For girls, Baby reached its peak popularity in 1995, achieving the 34.3% percentile (ranked #558) with 160 births per million. The name was most common in 1995, with 160 births per million (ranked 34.3% percentile). Since reaching a high point in 2021, the popularity of this name for girls has been declining. Currently, Baby ranks #938 for girls (1.0% percentile) with 8 births per million, which is 5.0% of its peak share of births.

This chart shows the total number of births per million babies in each year for the name "Baby".

1912 2023 19122023

Key Statistics

Total Births
6,046
Peak Births
308
Peak Year
1995
First Recorded
1912
Peak Percentile
34.3%
Current Percentile
1.0%
Peak Rank
#558
Current Rank
#938
Female statistics
Total Births
6,295
Peak Births
373
Peak Year
1994
First Recorded
1919
Peak Percentile
39.2%
Current Percentile
1.2%
Peak Rank
#472
Current Rank
#900
Male statistics

How to Pronounce Baby

Our model found one way to pronounce the name Baby. Click the play button under each pronunciation to hear it spoken aloud.

Our model is 100.0% confident that Baby is pronounced as BAY-bee, which has 2 syllables.

2
100.0%
BAY-bee (2 syllables)
Verified
100.0% confidence
B EY1 B IY0

Possible Additional Pronunciations

If none of the pronunciations above sound right to you, could you please check whether any of these related pronunciations should be applied to the name Baby? These are pronunciations that other similar names use, but which are not currently associated with Baby. If you think any of these are valid pronunciations for Baby, please vote using the thumbs up button.

About Pronunciation Data

Our confidence scores estimate the likelihood that a particular pronunciation is the most correct for a given name spelling. These scores are derived from pronunciation dictionaries, manual verification, your feedback, and a fine-tuned large language model trained to generate name pronunciations.

For any given spelling, confidence scores across all identified pronunciations sum to 100%. However, these scores don't account for the possibility of valid pronunciations that our model hasn't identified.

The raw pronunciations shown (like B EY1 B IY0) use the ARPAbet phoneme system, a standardized way to represent English speech sounds. Each symbol represents a distinct sound in American English. Visit the ARPAbet Wikipedia page to learn more about these phonetic symbols.

Pronunciation audio is generated by an open source text to speech model that has been customized to adhere to pronunciations provided in ARPAbet format, but sometimes pronunciations that differ subtly will sound identical, particularly if the only difference is the level of emphasis on a syllable or a single vowel sound.

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