2000s Baby Names

45,773 names were given to children in the United States between 2000 and 2009, 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

#289
Peter Peter is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "rock."
26,160 in the 2000s
#290
Damian Damian is a boy's name of Greek origin, from damao, meaning to tame or subdue.
26,063 in the 2000s
#291
Kendall Kendall means the valley of the River Kent, and Scotland ranks it 309th — above the United States at 329th, which is unusual for a name whose modern use is almost entirely American.
26,058 in the 2000s
#292
Alexandria Alexandria is the city before it is the name — Alexander founded it in 331 BC, and the feminine given name was formed from the place rather than directly from Alexandra, which took a different route.
25,979 in the 2000s
#293
Jeffrey Jeffrey is a boy's name from Germanic roots whose first element is genuinely disputed, though the second means peace.
25,956 in the 2000s
#294
Brendan Brendan is not Irish in origin — it comes from a Welsh word meaning a prince, borrowed into Irish, and its saint is credited with a transatlantic voyage six centuries before Columbus.
25,898 in the 2000s
#295
Travis Travis is a boy's name from an occupational surname meaning a toll collector, one who worked at a crossing.
25,766 in the 2000s
#296
Natalia Natalia is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "birthday," specifically Christmas Day.
25,558 in the 2000s
#297
Fernando Fernando means bold journey, and it is Germanic rather than Spanish — the Visigoths brought it to Iberia, where it became the royal name of Castile and Aragon and then traveled to the Americas.
25,257 in the 2000s
#298
Conner Conner means desiring hounds rather than loving them — the Irish joins a word for a hound or wolf to one meaning desire, and the softer lover of hounds gloss smooths over what was a warrior's name.
25,117 in the 2000s
#299
Laura Laura is a girl's name of Latin origin meaning "laurel," the tree whose leaves crowned Roman victors and poets.
25,081 in the 2000s
#300
Andres Andres is a boy's name of Greek origin meaning "manly" or "brave."
24,832 in the 2000s
#301
Javier Javier means the new house, and it is Basque rather than Spanish — Saint Francis Xavier was named for his family's castle at Xabier, so the name is a place that became a surname and then a first name.
24,702 in the 2000s
#302
Shawn Shawn is a boy's name, the phonetic American respelling of the Irish Seán, which is itself the Irish form of John.
24,543 in the 2000s
#303
Giovanni Giovanni is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "God is gracious," the Italian form of John.
24,443 in the 2000s
#304
Charlotte Charlotte is a girl's name of French origin meaning "free man," the feminine form of Charles, itself from the Germanic name Karl.
24,271 in the 2000s
#305
Skyler Skyler is Dutch and means a scholar — it respells Schuyler, a surname carried by one of New York's founding families, and it has nothing to do with the sky despite the spelling.
24,260 in the 2000s
#306
Rylee Rylee is a girl's name of Old English origin meaning "rye clearing."
24,227 in the 2000s
#307
Braden Braden means descendant of the salmon, and the fish is not decorative — the Salmon of Knowledge is the center of one of the best-known Irish stories, in which Fionn gains all wisdom by burning his thumb on it.
24,209 in the 2000s
#308
Cheyenne Cheyenne is not the Cheyenne people's own name for themselves — it is a Sioux word meaning red speakers, applied from outside.
24,201 in the 2000s
#309
Devon Devon is the English county, named for the Dumnonii — a Celtic people whose own name may mean the deep ones, possibly referring to mining.
24,094 in the 2000s
#310
Margaret Margaret is a girl's name of Greek origin meaning "pearl," from margarites.
23,931 in the 2000s
#311
Jonah Jonah is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "dove," from Yonah.
23,882 in the 2000s
#312
Kelsey Kelsey is a girl's name from an English place name, and its two proposed meanings — ship's victory and Cenel's island — have nothing in common.
23,857 in the 2000s
#313
Naomi Naomi is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "pleasantness," from No'omi.
23,781 in the 2000s
#314
Miranda Miranda was coined by Shakespeare for The Tempest around 1611, from the Latin for to be wondered at.
23,768 in the 2000s
#315
Bradley Bradley is a boy's name from an English place name meaning broad meadow.
23,757 in the 2000s
#316
Mikayla Mikayla respells Michaela, and the Hebrew behind both is a question — who is like God — whose expected answer is nobody.
23,743 in the 2000s
#317
Cesar Cesar is a boy's name from the Roman family name Caesar, whose own meaning the Romans could not agree on.
23,677 in the 2000s
#318
Emmanuel Emmanuel is a boy's name of Hebrew origin meaning "God is with us."
23,619 in the 2000s
#319
Manuel Manuel is a boy's name meaning God is with us, the Spanish short form of Emmanuel.
23,469 in the 2000s
#320
Ana Ana is a girl's name of Hebrew origin meaning "favor" or "grace," and it is the form of Anna used across Spanish, Portuguese and Slavic Europe.
23,267 in the 2000s
#321
Alicia Alicia is a girl's name of Germanic origin meaning "noble," a Latinate form of Alice.
23,166 in the 2000s
#322
Kelly Kelly is a name from the Irish surname Ó Ceallaigh, borne almost entirely by men for most of its history and now 86 percent female in our data.
23,158 in the 2000s
#323
Jordyn Jordyn respells Jordan, and the river came first — the name means flowing down, describing the Jordan's fall from the Galilee hills to the lowest exposed land on earth.
23,157 in the 2000s
#324
Mckenzie Mckenzie means son of Coinneach, and the z was never a z — it replaced a lost Scots letter called yogh, so the name has been mispronounced into its own spelling.
22,943 in the 2000s
#325
Jillian Jillian means youthful, and it descends from the same Roman family name as July — Julius, Julia, Jill and Jillian all come from the gens that claimed descent from Venus.
22,861 in the 2000s
#326
Daisy Daisy is a girl's name of English origin naming the flower, and its meaning is unusually literal: daisy comes from the Old English dægesege, "day's eye," because the flower opens its petals at dawn and closes them at dusk.
22,853 in the 2000s
#327
Edgar Edgar is a boy's name meaning wealthy spear, and it is one of very few Old English names still in wide use.
22,615 in the 2000s
#328
Ashlyn Ashlyn has two possible sources and they disagree completely — the Irish aisling means a dream or vision, while the English reading is simply an ash-tree clearing.
22,506 in the 2000s
#329
Mario Mario is a boy's name from a Roman family name of uncertain meaning, and the video game character was named after a real landlord — Mario Segale, who owned the warehouse Nintendo rented in Seattle.
22,474 in the 2000s
#330
Erik Erik is a boy's name meaning ever-ruler or sole ruler, from Old Norse.
22,449 in the 2000s
#331
Reagan Reagan means little king, and our data shows the opposite of what most people assume — American births more than halved during the first two years of Ronald Reagan's presidency and did not take off until a decade after he left office.
22,400 in the 2000s
#332
Sabrina Sabrina is the Latin name of the River Severn, and the legend behind it is a drowning — a princess thrown into the river became its spirit.
22,372 in the 2000s
#333
Caitlin Caitlin is a girl's name of Greek origin, the Irish form of Katherine, and its English mispronunciation generated a whole family of new names.
22,315 in the 2000s
#334
Summer Summer is a girl's name of Old English origin taken from the season, from sumor.
22,238 in the 2000s
#335
Edwin Edwin is a boy's name from Old English meaning rich friend, borne by a Northumbrian king whose fortress may have given Edinburgh its name.
22,139 in the 2000s
#336
Ruby Ruby is a girl's name of Latin origin naming the red gemstone, from ruber, meaning red.
22,086 in the 2000s

What made a 2000s name

Nothing about the sound of it. A name is on this page because children in the United States were registered with it between 2000 and 2009, and its position is simply how many. Every list of "2000s names" you will find elsewhere is somebody's sense of the period; this one is the register.

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.