Humanverse

Delaney vs Delynn

American parents have registered 46,650 Delaneys since 1880, against 818 Delynns. Delaney is still ahead, with 1,295 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Delaney against Delynn, 1880 to 2025 0 600 1.2k 1.8k 2.4k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Delaney Delynn

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 98 years in which either name was published, Delaney for 69 years and Delynn for 29 years. The lead changed hands 6 times.

Side by side

  Delaney Delynn
Total US births 46,650818
Most in one year 2,03042
Babies in 2025 1,295under 5
Estimated living today 46,000690
Median age today 1760
Peak year 20041958
Best rank 169th girls1,820th girls
Rank in 2025 242ndunranked
First recorded 19121931
Girls / boys 45,437 / 1,213719 / 99

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 Delynns alive today are over 60; half the Delaneys are over 17. That is 43 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

Related comparisons

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