Humanverse

Robert vs Robyne

American parents have registered 4,869,849 Roberts since 1880, against 666 Robynes. Robert is still ahead, with 3,777 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Robert against Robyne, 1880 to 2025 0 25k 50k 75k 100k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Robert Robyne

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

Robert 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 1999, when Robert had 14,564 and Robyne had 8.

Side by side

  Robert Robyne
Total US births 4,869,849666
Most in one year 91,89229
Babies in 2025 3,777under 5
Estimated living today 2.6 million590
Median age today 6057
Peak year 19471957
Best rank 2nd boys2,028th girls
Rank in 2025 92ndunranked
First recorded 18801947
Girls / boys 20,119 / 4,849,730666 / 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 Roberts alive today are over 60; half the Robynes are over 57. That is 3 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 Robert Robyne
France 419,30085
England and Wales 27,7727

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: Robert and Robyne.