Humanverse

Nathaniel vs Naturelle

American parents have registered 288,265 Nathaniels since 1880, against 46 Naturelles. Nathaniel is still ahead, with 2,565 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Nathaniel against Naturelle, 1880 to 2025 0 2k 4k 6k 8k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Nathaniel Naturelle

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

Nathaniel 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 2004, when Nathaniel had 6,710 and Naturelle had 17.

Side by side

  Nathaniel Naturelle
Total US births 288,26546
Most in one year 6,82917
Babies in 2025 2,565under 5
Estimated living today 249,00050
Median age today 2620
Peak year 20022004
Best rank 62nd boys6,768th girls
Rank in 2025 140thunranked
First recorded 18802004
Girls / boys 1,162 / 287,10346 / 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 Nathaniels alive today are over 26; half the Naturelles are over 20. That is 6 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Both names abroad

Countries whose statistics office publishes both names, so the comparison can be made somewhere other than the United States.

Country Nathaniel Naturelle
France 2,04015

Every spelling a country files separately is added together, over whatever years that country publishes — which is not the same range in any two of them, so read the columns against each other and not the rows.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

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