Nikolay
Nikolay reached its high-water mark in 2010 at number 3,377, and has been recorded 507 times in all. In 2025 it ranked 6,143rd. About 500 Nikolays are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 13.
Popularity, 1880–2025
boys named Nikolay
By the numbers
- Total US births
- 507
- Estimated living today
- 500
- Median age today
- 13
- Peak year
- 2010
- Best rank
- 3,377th
- Rank in 2025
- 6,143rd
- First recorded
- 1992
How old the living Nikolays are
born that year still alive today
Of the 507 babies given the name since 1992, about 500 are alive — 99 in every hundred. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 2012 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.
Notable Nikolays
- Nikolay Nekrasov (1821–1878)Russian poet, writer, critic, editor and publisher
- Nikolay Karamzin (1766–1826)Russian writer, poet, critic
- Nikolay Basov (1922–2001)Soviet physicist
- Nikolay Chernyshevsky (1828–1889)Russian writer and nihilist philosopher
- Nikolay Semyonov (1896–1986)Soviet physical chemist
- Nikolay Przhevalsky (1839–1888)Russian soldier, explorer, & geographer
- Nikolay Dobrolyubov (1836–1861)Russian critic and philosopher
- Nikolay Gumilev (1886–1921)Russian poet
People named Nikolay with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).
Where Nikolay is most common
Relative to how many babies each state records, Nikolay is most concentrated in California (5.7×).
Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.
Names of 2010
The most popular boys’ names the year Nikolay peaked:
Nikolay elsewhere
| Country | Spelling | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Norway boys | Nikolay | 310 | 308th |
| England and Wales boys | Nikolay | 189 | 1,250th |
| France boys | Nikolay | 25 | 4,525th |
| Poland boys | Nikolay | 9 birth registrations | 492nd |
| Belgium boys | Nikolay | 5 | 1,382nd |
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.
Nikolay by city
| City | Years | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|---|
| Berlin boys | 2017–2023 | 6 | 580th |
One city over a few years, so these are much smaller numbers than the national ones above and not comparable with them.
Nikolay 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 boys | Nikolay | 90 | 92 |
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.
Where Nikolay lives in Spain
Not a count of births but of people: 1,403 men called Nikolay were living in Spain on 1 January 2025, of every age, born in any year. Where they live is not spread evenly.
Men: the provinces where it is densest
| Province | Spelling | People | Per thousand | Place there |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Segovia | Nikolay | 46 | 0.579 | 185 |
| Valladolid | Nikolay | 65 | 0.253 | 309 |
| Soria | Nikolay | 10 | 0.218 | 376 |
| Navarra | Nikolay | 69 | 0.204 | 436 |
| Burgos | Nikolay | 35 | 0.193 | 422 |
| Girona | Nikolay | 56 | 0.134 | 607 |
Listed in 39 of Spain's 52 provinces. In the other 13 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
Nikolay 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.