Shirley: Popularity, Rank and History

By the Baby Name Data Editorial Team · Last updated: October 2026

Shirley has been recorded in U.S. Social Security Administration baby name data in 145 of the 145 years covered by this site, first appearing in 1880 and most recently in 2024. Across that whole span, parents recorded 695,797 births with this name, split between 686,246 girls and 9,551 boys. Because the larger side of that split is girls, this page follows the girls ranking table as its main story, while still reporting the combined total above so the name can be compared fairly with every other name in the top 100 all-time list. Every figure here is a direct count from the SSA file: there are no estimates, no projections, and no names added from any other source.

The single biggest year for Shirley was 1935, when 42,365 girls received the name and it reached rank 2 nationally. A name's peak year matters because it shows the moment when the name competed most successfully against every other name chosen that year. Rank and count tell slightly different stories: the count can rise simply because more babies were born overall, while the rank and the share of births strip out that effect. In 1935, Shirley accounted for 4.04% of all recorded girls births, which is the cleanest measure of how dominant it was at its height compared with peaks reached in smaller or larger birth years.

Shirley by decade

The decade table below is where the long story of Shirley becomes easiest to read. A decade total smooths out single-year spikes and shows whether a name was a brief fashion or a durable fixture. Names that hold high decade totals for forty or fifty years behave very differently from names that post one enormous decade and then fade, and Shirley can be placed on that spectrum directly from these ten-year sums and the best rank it managed inside each decade.

In the 1880s, Shirley recorded 179 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 378, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 1890s, Shirley recorded 535 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 347, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 1900s, Shirley recorded 1,710 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 198, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. During the 1910s, Shirley stayed inside the top 100 for girls, with a best rank of 89 and 12,742 births recorded over the ten years, a solid and visible presence without quite reaching the very top of the table. In the 1920s, Shirley was a top-ten name for girls, reaching as high as rank 9 and recording 98,601 births across the decade, one of its strongest ten-year stretches in the entire file. In the 1930s, Shirley was a top-ten name for girls, reaching as high as rank 2 and recording 229,378 births across the decade, one of its strongest ten-year stretches in the entire file. In the 1940s, Shirley was a top-ten name for girls, reaching as high as rank 9 and recording 171,780 births across the decade, one of its strongest ten-year stretches in the entire file. During the 1950s, Shirley stayed inside the top 100 for girls, with a best rank of 19 and 108,807 births recorded over the ten years, a solid and visible presence without quite reaching the very top of the table.

During the 1960s, Shirley stayed inside the top 100 for girls, with a best rank of 70 and 38,077 births recorded over the ten years, a solid and visible presence without quite reaching the very top of the table. In the 1970s, Shirley recorded 10,520 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 193, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 1980s, Shirley recorded 5,073 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 380, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 1990s, Shirley recorded 3,692 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 510, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 2000s, Shirley recorded 2,734 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 781, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 2010s, Shirley recorded 1,752 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 1213, placing it well down the popularity order for that period. In the 2020s, Shirley recorded 666 births for girls across the decade, with a best annual rank of 1453, placing it well down the popularity order for that period.

Rank history in selected years

This table samples the record at intervals so the shape of the history is visible at a glance: the birth count, the national rank among girls, and the share of all girls births for that year. Shares are included deliberately. In the 1880 file the recorded birth population is far smaller than in the peak birth years of the twentieth century, so a modest count in 1880 can represent a larger share, and a larger rank, than the same count would earn today. Reading count, rank, and share together is the method this site recommends on every page, and it is explained in full on the methodology page linked in the footer.

Recent years and the other side of the table

Between 2010 and 2024 the annual count moved from 178 to 151, a change of -15.2 percent, which is the clearest short-hand for where Shirley stands right now: losing ground in the most recent data. In 2000, for comparison, Shirley recorded 259 births for girls, and in 2010 it recorded 178. Placing 2024 between those two reference points shows whether the latest figure is part of a steady climb, a steady slide, or a plateau after earlier movement. None of these short windows should be read on their own: a name recovering from a low base can post large percentage gains while still ranking modestly, and a name easing down from a peak can lose percentage points while remaining one of the most used names in the country.

Shirley also appears on the boys side of the file, with 9,551 recorded births between 1880 and 2024. That secondary use is much smaller than the 686,246 births recorded for girls, and SSA ranks each sex separately, so the rank history above follows the girls table only. Counting both sides together, Shirley totals 695,797 recorded births, which is the figure that places it at number 85 on this site's all-time combined list. Readers comparing names should keep the two sides separate, because a rank earned among girls and a rank earned among boys describe two different fields of competing names in the same year.

To explore further, compare Shirley with the full rankings for its peak year (1935) through the years index, browse the decade rankings, or return to the complete A–Z list of name pages. The state pages show how the biggest states ranked names in 2024, which often differs from the national order in the smaller details even when the same few names lead both tables.

Frequently asked questions

How many babies named Shirley were born in 2024?
In 2024 the SSA recorded 151 girls named Shirley, ranked 1453 among girls that year.

When was Shirley most popular?
Shirley peaked in 1935 with 42,365 births for girls, reaching rank 2 that year in SSA records.

How many people named Shirley appear in SSA records since 1880?
SSA records show 695,797 births named Shirley from 1880 through 2024, counting both sexes together.

Disclaimer: Baby Name Data publishes statistics drawn from U.S. Social Security Administration baby name records. Figures are counts of Social Security card applications by year of birth and are shown for general information only. Counts below five in any year, sex, or state are not released by the SSA and are not estimated here. Nothing on this page is advice about what to name a child.

Data: U.S. Social Security Administration baby name records, 1880–2024, retrieved October 2026. Source: ssa.gov/oact/babynames/