Bart vs Bartholomew
American parents have registered 16,361 Barts since 1880, against 4,271 Bartholomews. But in 2025 it was Bartholomew that was commoner, 39 babies to fewer than five.
Babies given each name, 1880–2025
Bart Bartholomew
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 145 years in which either name was published, Bart for 91 years and Bartholomew for 54 years. The lead changed hands 25 times.
- 1887–1902 Bart ahead, apart from 2 short spells
- 1906–1921 Bartholomew ahead, apart from one short spell
- 1922–1990 Bart ahead, apart from one short spell
- 1995–2025 Bartholomew ahead, apart from 2 short spells
16 shorter spells of a year or two are folded into the spans above rather than listed separately.
Side by side
| Bart | Bartholomew | |
|---|---|---|
| Total US births | 16,361 | 4,271 |
| Most in one year | 1,022 | 75 |
| Babies in 2025 | under 5 | 39 |
| Estimated living today | 12,000 | 2,700 |
| Median age today | 59 | 46 |
| Peak year | 1959 | 1969 |
| Best rank | 249th boys | 880th boys |
| Rank in 2025 | unranked | 3,089th |
| First recorded | 1880 | 1880 |
| Girls / boys | 5 / 16,356 | 0 / 4,271 |
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 Barts alive today are over 59; half the Bartholomews are over 46. That is 13 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.
Where each one is strongest
- Bart Utah (6.1×), Idaho (4.6×), Wyoming (3.4×)
- Bartholomew New York (6.2×), Massachusetts (3.1×), New Jersey (2.4×)
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 | Bart | Bartholomew |
|---|---|---|
| England and Wales | 17 | 226 |
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: Bart and Bartholomew.