Nameberry Faves II: The Boys’ Names Nameberryites Love Most

Nameberry Faves II: The Boys’ Names Nameberryites Love Most

A couple of weeks ago, we looked at the favorite girls’ names on a Nameberry Message Board thread–led by the lovely Beatrix, Penelope and Clementine–and now it’s time to look over at the boys’ side.

The most striking result is the strong showing for the good old traditional, timeless classics, with many votes for William, Henry, Charles, James, Edward, Joseph, George, and Thomas, and a resurgence of interest in Theodore (#2!–perhaps because of the popularity of nickname Theo), Frederick, and Peter.  Does this mean that parents are still (or once again) looking at safer, more conservative choices for their sons than their daughters?  Is it somehow a reflection of the cloudy economic climate?

Some smaller trends noted: a preponderance of names starting with the vowel EElliot (in its various spellings), Edward, Emmett, Everett, Ethan, Ezra, Elias; and the characteristic nameberry love of some quirkier choices, several not found in the Top 500 of the Social Security list–Gideon, Amos, Emmett, Dexter, Atticus, Asa, Harvey, Callum and Cullen–and some not even on the list at all–Dashiell, Archer, Malachy, Laszlo, Ambrose.  It takes time for the rest of the world to catch up!

So here, as of today, are your top choices:

WILLIAM and HENRY–tied

THEODORE

OLIVER

CHARLES

JAMES

GIDEON

AUGUST

MILO, NATHANIEL

NOAH, ELIOT/ELLIOT/ELLIOTT, EDWARD, EMMETT, JASPER

JUDE

LUKE, BENJAMIN, DASHIELL, EVERETT, OWEN

And then:

LEVI

ETHAN

GEORGE

GRAYSON

CALVIN

DESMOND

FELIX

HUGO

FREDERICK

SEBASTIAN

ADAM

DECLAN

Followed by:

AMOS

FINN

HUDSON

JACK

JACOB

JOSEPH

NATHAN

PETER

THOMAS

And the runners-up:

AIDAN/AIDEN, AMBROSE, ARCHER, ARLO, ARTHUR, ASA, ATTICUS, BARNABY, CALLUM, CULLEN, CHRISTOPHER, DANIEL, DEXTER, DOMINIC, DONOVAN, EDMUND, ELIAS, EZRA, FINLAY/FINLEY, HARVEY, JACKSON, JOSIAH, JULIAN, LASZLO, LIAM, LANDON, MALACHY, MILES, NICHOLAS, OSCAR, QUINN, RHYS, RONAN, SILAS, SIMON, TOBIAS, TRISTAN, TRUMAN, WALTER

As with the girls, we’ve also tallied up the names that have received the most 5-star ratings by visitors.  Here are the Top 25:

HENRY

JASPER

FINN

MILO

OLIVER

FELIX

OSCAR

ASHER

ATTICUS

JUDE

JAMES

LEO

LIAM

JACK

ELI

ELIJAH

OWEN

JACKSON

BENJAMIN

WILLIAM

EZRA

BECKETT

NOAH

SEBASTIAN

DASHIELL

About the Author

Linda Rosenkrantz

Linda Rosenkrantz

Linda Rosenkrantz is the co-founder of Nameberry, and co-author with Pamela Redmond of the ten baby naming books acknowledged to have revolutionized American baby naming. You can follow her personally at InstagramTwitter and Facebook. She is also the author of the highly acclaimed New York Review Books Classics novel Talk and a number of other books.