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Kole vs Kolsen

American parents have registered 9,855 Koles since 1880, against 813 Kolsens. Kole is still ahead, with 165 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Kole against Kolsen, 1880 to 2025 0 125 250 375 500 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Kole Kolsen

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

Kole has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1969 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 2024, when Kole had 171 and Kolsen had 156.

Side by side

  Kole Kolsen
Total US births 9,855813
Most in one year 433156
Babies in 2025 165150
Estimated living today 9,700810
Median age today 163
Peak year 20092024
Best rank 597th boys1,262nd boys
Rank in 2025 1,244th1,297th
First recorded 19692005
Girls / boys 70 / 9,7850 / 813

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 Koles alive today are over 16; half the Kolsens are over 3. That is 13 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: Kole and Kolsen.