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Stokes vs Stoney

American parents have registered 3,260 Stoneys since 1880, against 196 Stokeses. Stoney is still ahead, with 49 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Stokes against Stoney, 1880 to 2025 0 80 160 240 320 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Stokes Stoney

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 103 years in which either name was published, Stoney for 89 years and Stokes for 14 years. The lead changed hands once.

Side by side

  Stokes Stoney
Total US births 1963,260
Most in one year 11259
Babies in 2025 849
Estimated living today 902,800
Median age today 546
Peak year 19161963
Best rank 2,389th boys498th boys
Rank in 2025 8,910th3,240th
First recorded 18921922
Girls / boys 0 / 196168 / 3,092

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 Stoneys alive today are over 46; half the Stokeses are over 5. That is 41 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: Stokes and Stoney.