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Nanette vs Nanie

American parents have registered 16,894 Nanettes since 1880, against 778 Nanies. Nanette is still ahead, with 6 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Nanette against Nanie, 1880 to 2025 0 200 400 600 800 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Nanette Nanie

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 142 years in which either name was published, Nanette for 105 years and Nanie for 37 years. The lead changed hands 3 times.

Side by side

  Nanette Nanie
Total US births 16,894778
Most in one year 77232
Babies in 2025 6under 5
Estimated living today 13,00030
Median age today 6488
Peak year 19571914
Best rank 331st girls1,059th girls
Rank in 2025 13,208thunranked
First recorded 18921881
Girls / boys 16,894 / 0778 / 0

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 Nanies alive today are over 88; half the Nanettes are over 64. That is 24 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: Nanette and Nanie.