Kit
About Kit
Actor Kit Harington, aka the dreamy Jon Snow on Game of Thrones, has given this nickname-name new style and appeal for boys. Actress Jodie Foster used it for her son back in the 2000s, while actor Kit Connor of Heartstopper fame may have introduced it to a wider audience.
Kit is one of those names that is gender-neutral but has a different derivation for boys and girls. For boys, it originated as a short form of Christopher, while for girls, it's an updated diminutive of Katherine.
Kit as a full name is still beneath the Top 1000 for both sexes in the US, but it's getting more popular. In a recent year, 134 baby girls and 181 baby boys were named Kit, up from 105 and 129 in 2021.
Kit also has the literary appeal of having appeared in works by Charles Dickens and Thomas Hardy, and a nature/animal connection, given that it is used for the offspring of foxes, rabbits, and weasels.
Pronounced KIT.
As of October 2026, Kit ranked #1103 in US births in 2025 SSA, peaked at #786 in 1890, Nameberry popularity #97.
Editor: Sophie Kihm
Sources: US popularity data is from the Social Security Administration. Meanings and origins are from Nameberry's name references.
Popularity & trends
Data table
| Year | US rank | Births | Per million |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2014 | #4,629 | 21 | 10.9 |
| 2015 | #2,943 | 40 | 20.9 |
| 2016 | #2,264 | 59 | 31.1 |
| 2017 | #2,079 | 67 | 36.2 |
| 2018 | #1,771 | 87 | 47.9 |
| 2019 | #1,628 | 101 | 56.3 |
| 2020 | #1,492 | 114 | 66 |
| 2021 | #1,416 | 130 | 74.3 |
| 2022 | #1,371 | 137 | 78.5 |
| 2023 | #1,152 | 182 | 106.4 |
| 2024 | #1,150 | 182 | 105.6 |
| 2025 | #1,103 | 195 | 114.2 |
World rankings
Similar names
These 20 names were selected by our users looking for other names like Kit.
- Odis
- Roscoe
- Otis
- Otto
- Clarence
- Casper
- Oaklan
- Forrest
- Remy
- Orson
- Peirce
- Alfie
- Bowie
- Gordie
- Wren
- Rhodes
- Wilder
- Jules
- Fletcher
- Archie
Kit on lists
Famous Kits
- Christopher Houston "Kit" Carson
American frontiersman
- Christopher Catesby "Kit" Harington
English actor
- Kit Watkins
American jazz singer
- Christopher "Kit" French
American singer of band Parachute
- Christopher Cornelius "Kit" Culkin
American actor and father of Macaulay Culkin
- Christopher "Kit" Marlowe
English playwright
- Christopher "Kit" Foster (b. 2001)
son of American actress Jodie Foster
- Kit Bomer (b. 2005)
son of actor Matt Bomer
- Kit James Thornton (b. 2015)
son of actors James Thornton & Joanna Page
- Christopher Carlton "Kit" Cumberbatch (b. 2015)
son of Benedict Cumberbatch and Sophie Hunter
- Kit Rooney (b. 2016)
son of footballer Wayne Rooney
- Kit Harry Francis Judd (b. 2017)
son of McFly drummer Harry Judd
Kit in pop culture
- Christopher "Kit" Walker Jr.
aka The Phantom, comic book superhero
- Kit Walker
character on TV's "American Horror Story: Asylum"
- Christopher "Kit" Rodriguez
a character in the "Young Wizards" series
- Kit Cloudkicker
character in Disney's animated series TaleSpin
- Kit Ramsey
a main character in film "Bowfinger"
- Kit Nelson
character on TV's "Alcatraz"
- Kit aka Prince Charming
character in 2015 Disney film Cinderella
- Kit Fisto
character in the Star Wars series
- Kit Oxenford
character in Ken Follett's "Whiteout"
- Kit Carruthers
character in the film "Badlands"
- Christopher "Kit" Herondale
character in the Dark Artifices series by Cassandra Clare
- "Kit and Kitty"
a novel by R. D. Blackmore
- Kit Kat
chocolate bar
- Kit
term for a young animal such as a fox