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Cala vs Callie

American parents have registered 70,827 Callies since 1880, against 502 Calas. Callie is still ahead, with 1,754 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Cala against Callie, 1880 to 2025 0 500 1k 1.5k 2k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Cala Callie

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

Callie has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1880 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 1988, when Cala had 25 and Callie had 558.

Side by side

  Cala Callie
Total US births 50270,827
Most in one year 301,763
Babies in 2025 91,754
Estimated living today 49055,000
Median age today 2817
Peak year 19902014
Best rank 3,523rd girls186th girls
Rank in 2025 10,107th175th
First recorded 19501880
Girls / boys 502 / 070,190 / 637

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 Calas alive today are over 28; half the Callies are over 17. That is 11 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

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