Humanverse

Cutler vs Cutter

American parents have registered 1,682 Cutters since 1880, against 1,042 Cutlers. Cutter is still ahead, with 48 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Cutler against Cutter, 1880 to 2025 0 20 40 60 80 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Cutler Cutter

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 42 years in which either name was published, Cutter for 34 years and Cutler for 8 years. The lead changed hands 10 times.

Side by side

  Cutler Cutter
Total US births 1,0421,682
Most in one year 6677
Babies in 2025 3948
Estimated living today 1,0001,700
Median age today 1218
Peak year 20142003
Best rank 2,098th boys1,630th boys
Rank in 2025 3,089th2,676th
First recorded 19851983
Girls / boys 0 / 1,0420 / 1,682

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 Cutters alive today are over 18; half the Cutlers are over 12. That is 6 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.

Compare something else

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