Humanverse

Shaune vs Shawn

American parents have registered 339,597 Shawns since 1880, against 779 Shaunes. Shawn is still ahead, with 412 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Shaune against Shawn, 1880 to 2025 0 4k 8k 12k 16k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Shaune Shawn

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

Shawn has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1931 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 1950, when Shaune had 5 and Shawn had 292.

Side by side

  Shaune Shawn
Total US births 779339,597
Most in one year 6014,688
Babies in 2025 under 5412
Estimated living today 710310,000
Median age today 4947
Peak year 19781971
Best rank 1,870th boys28th boys
Rank in 2025 unranked681st
First recorded 19501931
Girls / boys 335 / 44433,055 / 306,542

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 Shaunes alive today are over 49; half the Shawns are over 47. That is 2 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

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