Lorelei
Lorelei is a girl's name that peaked in 2016, when it was the 450th most popular in the United States. In 2025 it ranked 441st. About 17,000 Loreleis are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 12.
Popularity, 1880–2025
girls named Lorelei
By the numbers
- Total US births
- 18,189
- Estimated living today
- 17,000
- Median age today
- 12
- Peak year
- 2016
- Best rank
- 450th
- Rank in 2025
- 441st
- First recorded
- 1916
How old the living Loreleis are
born that year still alive today
Of the 18,189 babies given the name since 1916, about 17,000 are alive — 94 in every hundred. Roughly 11,000 of them are children and 1,600 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 German
Borrowed from German Lorelei (“murmuring rock or lurking rock”), but not used as a given name in Germany. The Lorelei (or Lorelei, Loreleï, Lore Lay, Lore-Ley, Lurley, Lurelei, Lurlei) is an infamous maritime disaster site because of the Rhine's current and the surrounding terrain. The shipwrecks have been subject to mythological explanation attempts since around 900 AD.
Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.
Notable Loreleis
- Lorelei Lee (born 1981)American pornographic actress and writer
People named Lorelei with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).
Where Lorelei is most common
Relative to how many babies each state records, Lorelei is most concentrated in Washington (1.8×), Florida (1.6×), Virginia (1.5×), Wisconsin (1.5×).
Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.
Names of 2016
The most popular girls’ names the year Lorelei peaked:
Lorelei elsewhere
| Country | Spelling | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| France girls | Lorelei +2 spellings | 2,220 | 448th |
| England and Wales girls | Lorelei | 644 | 806th |
| Belgium girls | Lorelei +1 spelling | 30 | 946th |
| Scotland girls | Lorelei | 11 | 531st |
| Ireland girls | Lorelei | 7 | 752nd |
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.
Lorelei: rank by region
In 2007, Lorelei was given 5 times or more in 1 region of Belgium.
| Region | Spelling | Place | Children |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wallonia | Lorelei | 493 | 5 |
Each of these is the top of a list the statistics office cut off somewhere – Belgium below 5 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.
Lorelei by city
| City | Years | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berlin girls | 2017–2023 | 6 | 538th |
One city over a few years, so these are much smaller numbers than the national ones above and not comparable with them.
Lorelei 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 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Finland girls | Lorelei | — | 6 |
A count of people on a register – 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.
Related names
Lorelei 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.