Berkeley
Berkeley reached its high-water mark in 2017 at number 1,761, and has been recorded 2,973 times in all. It is given to both boys and girls. In 2025 it ranked 2,485th. About 2,700 Berkeleys are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 12.
Popularity, 1880–2025
girls named Berkeley boys named Berkeley
Girls and boys called Berkeley
years more girls than boys years more boys than girls
Both, throughout, without either side ever taking it over: 2,073 girls and 900 boys in all, and in 2025 the split was 71 to 10.
The girls’ share of each year’s babies of the name, in the 30 years in which at least 25 babies got it. The line touches the middle more often than there are crossings marked: a year or two on the other side is not a name changing hands, and only a move that holds for 5 counted years and reaches 60/40 is recorded as one. All 581 names that changed sex.
By the numbers
- Total US births
- 2,973
- Estimated living today
- 2,700
- Median age today
- 12
- Peak year
- 2017
- Best rank
- 1,761st
- Rank in 2025
- 2,485th
- First recorded
- 1913
- Girls / boys
- 2,073 / 900
How old the living Berkeleys are
born that year still alive today
Of the 2,973 babies given the name since 1913, about 2,700 are alive — 90 in every hundred. Roughly 1,800 of them are children and 90 are 65 or over. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 2013 and half after.
An estimate, not a count. SSA births aged forward through SSA cohort life tables, which know nothing about who left the country or arrived in it — so for a name that mostly came to America rather than being born in it, this is a floor rather than a figure. Where you fall among living Americans.
Where the name comes from
Origin a surname
From Old English beorc (“birch”) + leah (“meadow, leigh”). Equivalent.
Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Where Berkeley is most common
Relative to how many babies each state records, Berkeley is most concentrated in Texas (4.5×), Virginia (3.9×), Georgia (2.4×), California (2.2×).
Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.
Names of 2017
The most popular girls’ names the year Berkeley peaked:
Related names
Berkeley against another name
Two names on one chart, with the year one overtook the other.
Try it on yourself
Source: US Social Security Administration, national and state baby-name files, 1880–2025. Counts include only births registered with the SSA, and names with fewer than five births in a year are not published. The living estimate applies SSA cohort life tables to those births; it counts people born in the United States, so it misses anyone who arrived later and anyone who has left.