Lilian
Lilian is a girl's name that peaked in 2007, when it was the 416th most popular in the United States. In 2025 it ranked 560th. About 18,000 Lilians are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 16.
Popularity, 1880–2025
girls named Lilian
By the numbers
- Total US births
- 20,470
- Estimated living today
- 18,000
- Median age today
- 16
- Peak year
- 2007
- Best rank
- 416th
- Rank in 2025
- 560th
- First recorded
- 1880
How old the living Lilians are
born that year still alive today
Of the 20,470 babies given the name since 1880, about 18,000 are alive — 89 in every hundred. Roughly 10,000 of them are children and 320 are 65 or over. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 2009 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 Latin
Used since the sixteenth century, possibly originally a pet form of Elizabeth, but generally accepted as a variant of Latin lilium (“lily”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Notable Lilians
- Lilian Thuram (born 1972)French footballer
- Ethel Lilian Voynich (1864–1960)British writer and musician
- Princess Lilian, Duchess of Halland (1915–2013)Welsh model who became a member of the Swedish royal family
- Lilian Harvey (1906–1968)Anglo-German actress and singer
- Lilian Garcia (born 1966)ring announcer and singer
- Lilian, Princess of Réthy (1916–2002)second wife of king Leopold III of Belgium
- Lilian Calmejane (born 1992)French cyclist
- Lilian Bach (born 1975)Nigerian actress
People named Lilian with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).
Where Lilian is most common
Relative to how many babies each state records, Lilian is most concentrated in Arizona (2.0×), California (1.9×), Nevada (1.8×), Utah (1.7×).
Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.
Names of 2007
The most popular girls’ names the year Lilian peaked:
Lilian elsewhere
| Country | Spelling | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| France boys | Lilian | 26,945 | 60th |
| England and Wales girls | Lilian | 1,901 | 451st |
| Belgium boys | Lilian | 437 | 343rd |
| Switzerland girls | Lilian | 326 | 343rd |
| Ireland girls | Lilian | 317 | 220th |
| France girls | Lilian | 300 | 647th |
| Norway girls | Lilian | 191 | 253rd |
| Scotland girls | Lilian | 111 | 345th |
| Poland girls | Lilian | 62 birth registrations | 343rd |
| Belgium girls | Lilian | 22 | 1,170th |
| Poland boys | Lilian | 8 birth registrations | 729th |
Counts come from each country's own records and are not comparable with the US figures above, which cover different years and a different definition of a recorded name. Where a country writes the name several ways, the spellings are added together and the most common is shown. A row marked name registrations is counting something else: Portugal ranks each of a child's two given names separately, so a girl registered Maria Leonor is in both the Maria row and the Leonor row, and that figure is not a number of children.
Lilian: births by region
| Region | Country | Spelling | Births | Share of the region | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| German girls | Switzerland | Lilian | 307 | 0.025% | 249th |
| French girls | Switzerland | Lilian | 13 | 0.003% | 545th |
| Italian girls | Switzerland | Lilian | 5 | 0.008% | 184th |
| Romansh girls | Switzerland | Lilian | 1 | 0.027% | 15th |
Parts of a country counted above, not extra births. The share is what makes the regions comparable: they differ in size by a factor of three hundred.
By canton, Lilian is most concentrated in Aargau, where 0.03% of children were given it – 41 of them.
Lilian: rank by region
In 2025, Lilian was given 5 times or more in 1 region of Belgium.
| Region | Spelling | Place | Children |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flanders | Lilian | 836 | 5 |
In 2021, Lilian was among the 10 most common names in 1 region of Italy.
| Region | Spelling | Place | Children |
|---|---|---|---|
| Valle d'Aosta/Vallée d'Aoste | Lilian | 8 | 1 |
In 2024, Lilian was given 2 times or more in 1 region of Poland.
| Region | Spelling | Place | Children |
|---|---|---|---|
| Łódzkie | Lilian | 193 | 2 |
In 2018, with the country taken in 11 areas rather than 3, Lilian appears in the lists for Province of Liège (204th) and Province of Hainaut (242nd).
Each of these is the top of a list the statistics office cut off somewhere – Belgium below 5 children, Italy after 10 names, Poland below 2 children – and published nothing after. So a region missing here is one where the name fell outside what was published, not one where it went unused. Places are shared where names tie, and the further down a list a place is, the more names can share it.
Lilian by city
| City | Years | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berlin girls | 2017–2023 | 55 | 221st |
One city over a few years, so these are much smaller numbers than the national ones above and not comparable with them.
Lilian among the living
How many people each country's register counts under the name, rather than how many were given it in any one year. Each register was read on one date, and they are not the same date.
| Country | Spelling | First forename | Any forename |
|---|---|---|---|
| the Netherlands girls | Lilian | 3,860 | 5,264 |
| Finland girls | Lilian | 1,533 | 3,002 |
| the Netherlands boys | Lilian | — | 129 |
A count of people on a register – the Netherlands on 1 January 2018, Finland on 4 August 2026 – and not of births, so it cannot be compared with the figures above. Names with very few bearers are withheld, and a dash in the first-forename column means the register would not say rather than that nobody goes by it.
Where Lilian lives in Spain
Not a count of births but of people: 1,401 women called Lilian were living in Spain on 1 January 2025, of every age, born in any year. Where they live is not spread evenly.
Women: the provinces where it is densest
| Province | Spelling | People | Per thousand | Place there |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Melilla | Lilian | 11 | 0.254 | 532 |
| Ceuta | Lilian | 10 | 0.241 | 534 |
| Asturias | Lilian | 59 | 0.111 | 701 |
| Balears, Illes | Lilian | 60 | 0.096 | 803 |
| Palmas, Las | Lilian | 55 | 0.093 | 1,054 |
| Santa Cruz de Tenerife | Lilian | 51 | 0.092 | 998 |
Listed in 40 of Spain's 52 provinces. In the other 12 it is either held by fewer than 5 people – the point below which the source withholds a name – or it fell past the 5,000 names the source will print for one province. Neither means nobody there is called it. The rate is the source's own, not a share worked out here.
Related names
Lilian 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.