The top baby names of the 2010s — the decade that is drawing to a close — are dominated by classic names still used by a wide range of parents.
The top four girl names — Emma, Sophia, Olivia, and Isabella — along with the top three boy names — Noah, Liam, and Jacob — were each given to more than 150,000 babies in the US in the nine years from 2010 to 2018. (We won’t see the official 2019 count until after the decade ends, in May of 2020.)
What does that mean? Perhaps that these classic names that topped the popularity list for most of the 2010s will give way in the 2020s to a new crop of favorites.
At the top of the most popular names of the last decade, the 2000s, are several choices that are starting to feel almost quaint: Emily and Madison in the top two spots for girls, Michael and Joshua at Numbers 2 and 3 for boys. The Top 10 for boys in the 2000s included Andrew and Joseph and for girls, Samantha and Hannah, all solid tradtional names but no longer fashionable.
Some of the names at the top of the 2010s list have a lot of life left in them: Olivia and Charlotte for girls, notably, along with James and Elijah for boys. We’ve marked them and others still on the way up with an asterisk.
Top Girl Names of the 2010s
Top Boy Names of the 2010s
Which names will still be popular in the 2020s? We’d love to hear your ideas.
Pamela Redmond
Pamela Redmond is the cocreator and CEO of Nameberry and Baby Name DNA. The coauthor of ten groundbreaking books on names, Redmond is an internationally-recognized baby name expert, quoted and published widely in such media outlets as the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, The Today Show, CNN, and the BBC. She has written about baby names for The Daily Beast, The Huffington Post, and People.
Redmond is also a New York Times bestselling novelist whose books include Younger, the basis for the hit television show, and its sequel, Older. She has three new books in the works.