1990s Baby Names

22,219 names were given to children in the United States between 1990 and 1999, ranked below by how many.

A name's place is its total across those ten years. Names that appear in only some of the decade say so, because a name recorded once is a different fact from one recorded every year.

All Girls Boys Unisex

Rankings for

#796
Shania
6,256 in the 1990s
#797
Cheyanne
6,233 in the 1990s
#798
Robyn Robyn is a girl's name of Germanic origin meaning "bright fame."
6,229 in the 1990s
#800
Nicolette
6,213 in the 1990s
#801
Brittani
6,210 in the 1990s
#802
Frances Frances is a girl's name meaning a Frank, or a free one, and the feminine of Francis.
6,179 in the 1990s
#805
Tania Tania descends from a Sabine name nobody can translate, and Shakespeare's Titania is a different word — that one comes from the Titans, so the two are unrelated despite constant confusion.
6,158 in the 1990s
#806
Alma Alma is a girl's name with several competing origins: "nourishing" in Latin, "soul" in Spanish, and "young woman" in Hebrew.
6,158 in the 1990s
#807
Shanice
6,155 in the 1990s
#808
Mariana Mariana names the deepest place on earth by a long chain — the Mariana Trench is called after the Mariana Islands, which were named for a Spanish queen, so the name reaches the sea floor through a monarch.
6,147 in the 1990s
#809
Kristy Kristy is the seventh spelling of this name family in this group, and the count itself is the finding — one Latin word has produced seven separate pages on this site through American respelling alone.
6,136 in the 1990s
#814
India
6,125 in the 1990s
#815
Josie Josie is a girl's name that began as a pet form of Josephine, and so means "he will add," inherited from the Hebrew Yosef.
6,117 in the 1990s
#818
Lucy Lucy is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "light," from lux.
6,097 in the 1990s
#819
Giselle Giselle means a pledge, and the pledge was a person — the Germanic gisil named a hostage given as security for a treaty.
6,087 in the 1990s
#820
Johanna Johanna means God is gracious, and it heads one of the largest name families in Europe — Jane, Joan, Jean, Janet, Sinead and Siobhan are all the same name arriving by different national routes.
6,071 in the 1990s
#821
Jeanette Jeanette means God is gracious, a French double diminutive of Jeanne.
6,071 in the 1990s
#824
Christy Christy serves both Christine and Christopher, so it is used for both sexes — 98 percent of recorded births are female, but the masculine use remains ordinary in Ireland.
6,044 in the 1990s
#827
Allie Allie means noble, and it serves three different names at once — Alice, Allison and Alexandra all shorten to it, so which one a given Allie belongs to cannot be read off the name itself.
6,013 in the 1990s
#830
Noelle Noelle is a girl's name of French origin meaning "Christmas."
5,984 in the 1990s
#832
Irene Irene is a girl's name from the Greek word for peace, and the name of the goddess who personified it.
5,975 in the 1990s
#835
Haylee
5,954 in the 1990s
#838
Kaila
5,939 in the 1990s
#839
Carley
5,934 in the 1990s
#841
Breana
5,925 in the 1990s
#842
Simone Simone is a girl's name meaning he has heard, the French feminine of Simon.
5,921 in the 1990s
#843
Daniella Daniella means God is my judge, and the name is a legal claim — Daniel's story turns on false accusation and vindication, so the name states in advance who decides the case.
5,904 in the 1990s
#846
Shayna
5,836 in the 1990s
#847
Randi
5,834 in the 1990s
#850
Marilyn Marilyn is a girl's name usually read as a blend of Mary and Lyn.
5,766 in the 1990s
#851
Marlene Marlene was invented by the woman who made it famous — Marie Magdalene Dietrich contracted her own two names into one.
5,754 in the 1990s
#852
Kristi Kristi is the fifth spelling of this name to appear in this group — after Kristin, Kristen, Kristina and Kristine, all of them American-led despite the form being Scandinavian.
5,708 in the 1990s
#855
Donna Donna is a girl's name from the Italian word for a lady, a title used as a name.
5,676 in the 1990s
#857
Angelique Angelique means angelic, and the Greek root behind it simply means a messenger — the wings arrived much later in art, layered onto an ordinary word that described a person carrying news from one place to another.
5,661 in the 1990s
#858
Kourtney
5,654 in the 1990s
#862
Abbey
5,614 in the 1990s
#863
Tasha
5,608 in the 1990s
#864
Ciera
5,605 in the 1990s
#866
Iris Iris is a girl's name of Greek origin meaning "rainbow."
5,589 in the 1990s
#867
Elisa Elisa means my God is an oath, shortened from Elizabeth, and France ranks it 202nd — its strongest market, ahead of England and Wales at 377th, Ireland at 382nd and the United States at 458th.
5,576 in the 1990s
#868
Kenya
5,561 in the 1990s
#869
Yvette Yvette is a girl's name from a Germanic word for the yew tree, by way of Breton.
5,545 in the 1990s
#870
Nora Nora is a girl's name that developed as a short form of longer names, chiefly Honora and Eleanor, and is now used independently.
5,542 in the 1990s
#872
Talia Talia is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "dew from God."
5,538 in the 1990s
#879
Christa
5,471 in the 1990s
#883
Elaine Elaine is a girl's name, the Old French form of Helen, whose meaning was never established.
5,441 in the 1990s
#884
Ericka
5,438 in the 1990s
#885
Rachelle
5,437 in the 1990s

What Made a 1990s Name

Children in the United States were registered with it between 1990 and 1999. A name's position here is how many of them were.

Why Some Names Only Cover Part of the Decade

A name that appears in three of the ten years either arrived partway through or faded out — and either is more interesting than the total on its own. The statistics offices do not publish names given to very few children in a year, so a gap can also mean the count dropped below the threshold rather than to nothing.

Where to Go Next

Open any name to see its full curve — most of these have a hundred and forty years of it. Or compare the ends of the same measurement: the most popular names now and the rarest.