Humanverse

Ann vs Annelise

American parents have registered 471,625 Anns since 1880, against 6,523 Annelises. But in 2025 it was Annelise that was commoner, 226 babies to 225.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Ann against Annelise, 1880 to 2025 0 2.5k 5k 7.5k 10k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Ann Annelise

Each line is every baby given the name that year, girls and boys added together — the only count that means the same thing for both names. A line breaks where the name fell below five babies in a year — the point at which the SSA stops publishing it — rather than being drawn through a figure nobody published. A single published year in a gap shows as a dot.

Who was ahead

Of the 146 years in which either name was published, Ann for 145 years and Annelise for 1 year. The lead changed hands once.

Side by side

  Ann Annelise
Total US births 471,6256,523
Most in one year 9,068226
Babies in 2025 225226
Estimated living today 257,0006,400
Median age today 6617
Peak year 19572025
Best rank 44th girls1,071st girls
Rank in 2025 1,076th1,071st
First recorded 18801930
Girls / boys 470,261 / 1,3646,523 / 0

A rank is a position within one sex’s list for one year, so the two rank rows are not subtracted from one another and the winning column is not marked on them. The living figure is a life-table estimate, not a count.

Which name is older

Half of the Anns alive today are over 66; half the Annelises are over 17. That is 49 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Where each one is strongest

How much commoner the name is in that state than it is nationally, from births recorded since 1910.

Both names abroad

Countries whose statistics office publishes both names, so the comparison can be made somewhere other than the United States.

Country Ann Annelise
Norway 12,832268
France 5901,575
Scotland 1,44114
England and Wales 879353
Belgium 987

Every spelling a country files separately is added together, over whatever years that country publishes — which is not the same range in any two of them, so read the columns against each other and not the rows.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

Social Security Administration birth records, 1880–2025, public domain. Full histories: Ann and Annelise.