Humanverse

Trace vs Trapper

American parents have registered 14,112 Traces since 1880, against 992 Trappers. Trace is still ahead, with 340 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Trace against Trapper, 1880 to 2025 0 150 300 450 600 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Trace Trapper

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 70 years in which either name was published, Trace for 68 years and Trapper for 2 years. The lead changed hands 2 times.

Side by side

  Trace Trapper
Total US births 14,112992
Most in one year 53441
Babies in 2025 34013
Estimated living today 14,000970
Median age today 1818
Peak year 20082011
Best rank 510th boys2,852nd boys
Rank in 2025 757th6,446th
First recorded 19561975
Girls / boys 348 / 13,7640 / 992

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.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

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