Humanverse

Trace vs Trayson

American parents have registered 14,112 Traces since 1880, against 502 Traysons. Trace is still ahead, with 340 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

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

Trace Trayson

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

Trace has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1956 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 2016, when Trace had 287 and Trayson had 27.

Side by side

  Trace Trayson
Total US births 14,112502
Most in one year 53430
Babies in 2025 34015
Estimated living today 14,000500
Median age today 1812
Peak year 20082010
Best rank 510th boys3,531st boys
Rank in 2025 757th5,861st
First recorded 19561996
Girls / boys 348 / 13,7640 / 502

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 Traces alive today are over 18; half the Traysons are over 12. That is 6 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: Trace and Trayson.