Spelling Variants in SSA Data
The SSA tabulates names exactly as recorded, character for character, with two mechanical adjustments: hyphens and spaces are removed, so a double name written with a hyphen, a space, or neither is counted as a single identical entry. Everything else is literal. Two names that sound identical but are spelled differently are two separate names in the file, with separate counts, separate ranks, and separate histories, and this site preserves that separation on every page rather than merging variants into a combined figure that the source data does not support.
The consequences are largest near the top of modern tables. In 2024, for example, the girls' top ten contains two spellings that many readers would regard as one name with a variant spelling, each holding its own rank on its own count. If those counts were added together the combined total would outrank the year's actual leader, but that combined name does not exist in the records: no child was given it, and presenting it as a ranking would misstate what the data says. The same principle applies across decades and states, and it applies to this site's all-time combined list, which sums the two sexes for one exact spelling but never sums spellings.
For readers, the practical rule is simple: when comparing names, compare exact spellings, and when a name of interest has a common variant, check both pages of tables, because the variant may have the larger history. The year and decade tables on this site list each spelling in its own ranked position, so both can be found in the same table for any period in which both were in use. This literal approach can feel pedantic, but it is the only approach that keeps every published figure traceable to a specific line of the official file.
A further consequence appears in the all-time records. Several of the most recorded names in American history have well-known variant spellings that also accumulated substantial totals of their own across the same decades. Because the variants are never merged here, the all-time combined list ranks each spelling on exactly what the records show for that spelling, and a reader who adds two variants together in their head is building a figure that no page on this site will confirm. That discipline extends to hyphenated and spaced forms as well: since the SSA strips those separators before counting, this site follows the stripped form and does not attempt to split a combined entry back into parts the published file does not distinguish.
All of the conventions described here are applied uniformly across this site: the name pages, the year tables, the decade tables, and the state pages all draw on the same SSA files, the same release rules, and the same definitions of count, rank, and share. The full source statement, including coverage and limitations, is on the methodology page, and corrections or questions about any figure can be sent through the contact page, where every message is read against the underlying file before a reply is sent.
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/