Top 100 Baby Boy Names

Most Popular Names for Boys

Updated February 16, 2018
Newborn Baby on the Scale
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Choosing a name for your baby is a huge responsibility but it can also be a lot of fun. There are so many different ways to approach the choices and decisions to be made that finding a bit of advice or tradition can be beneficial for most families.  Here are some things to consider as you name your baby boy.

How Many Names Will He Have?

The traditional number of names in the United States is three names: a first name, a middle name, and your family or last name. There are certainly some families who have a tradition of two middle names, or no middle name at all. You might ask around and see how the number of names in your family varies, particularly as you merge two families' traditions around baby naming.

Whose Name Will He Share?

Naming a baby for a family member is a tradition that a lot of families share. While the thought process behind sharing a name may be common, how families execute this sharing of names is very different. Some families use a junior or senior style sharing of names where the son has the exact same name as the father, at least for the first child. If this extends beyond the original father and son, you typically use Roman numerals to depict this designation, for example: II, III, IV, V, etc.

There may also be name sharing that is less traditional. One example would be using the same first names but different middle names and calling the son by their middle name to help differentiate between the two. Another example would be to use different names, but ones that have similar meanings or sounds.

What to Keep in Mind When Naming a Boy

Up until about the late 1990s, baby names were decidedly girl names or boy names, with a few exceptions. The trend to have names that are gender neutral has drastically changed the landscape for some baby names. Gone are the days when you could look at a list of names and with one hundred percent certainty know that the names represented either a boy or a girl. 

This is something to keep in mind when choosing a name for your baby boy. Does the name you are choosing have a history of being male only? Is the name you're considering a name that is more gender fluid? Do you have a problem with that? Boys named Sue face obvious issues, but boys named Taylor or Keegan or Jayden, they may occasionally be mistaken for girls. This is something that is not a huge deal for most people, but if it matters to you, there are tools you can use, like the Social Security Administration's website with baby names. 

What Does the Social Security Administration Have to Do With Baby Names?

The Social Security Administration (SSA) releases birth certificate data around Mother's Day. It compiles the most popular baby names from the previous year and provides you with the most popular numbers. In addition, you can search their database for over one hundred years worth of data from 1879 forward.

There are really not a lot of surprises in the names list. The list of names for boys have much less variation on it than the name list for baby girls. Though there is typically not a lot of change or movement in the boys list. A few interesting things to note. Isaac is at the thirty-one spot, but Issac (a misspelled version) is at five hundred fifty-three. So always look to see if there are multiple spelling of a name that you like to compare how the spellings rank. Think Carl and Karl, Jackson and Jaxon as examples. This can be a good source of baby names, as well as baby name books.

1. Noah

2. Liam

3. William

4. Mason

5. James

6. Benjamin

7. Jacob

8. Michael

9. Elijah

10. Ethan

11. Alexander

12. Oliver

13. Daniel

14. Lucas

15. Matthew

16. Aiden

17. Jackson

18. Logan

19. David

20. Joseph

21. Samuel

22. Henry

23. Owen

24. Sebastian

25. Gabriel

26. Carter

27. Jayden

28. John

29. Luke

30. Anthony

31. Isaac

32. Dylan

33. Wyatt

34. Andrew

35. Joshua

36. Christopher

37. Grayson

38. Jack

39. Julian

40. Ryan

41. Jaxon

42. Levi

43. Nathan

44. Caleb

45. Hunter

46. Christian

47. Isaiah

48. Thomas

49. Aaron

50. Lincoln

51. Charles

52. Eli

53. Landon

54. Connor

55. Josiah

56. Jonathan

57. Cameron

58. Jeremiah

59. Mateo

60. Adrian

61. Hudson

62. Robert

63. Nicholas

64. Brayden

65. Nolan

66. Easton

67. Jordan

68. Colton

69. Evan

70. Angel

71. Asher

72. Dominic

73. Austin

74. Leo

75. Adam

76. Jace

77. Jose

78. Ian

79. Cooper

80. Gavin

81. Carson

82. Jaxson

83. Theodore

84. Jason

85. Ezra

86. Chase

87. Parker

88. Xavier

89. Kevin

90. Zachary

91. Tyler

92. Ayden

93. Elias

94. Bryson

95. Leonardo

96. Greyson

97. Sawyer

98. Roman

99. Brandon

100. Bentley