Primarily a boy's name · 100% boys
Origin: GermanSamuel is a male name and a surname of Hebrew origin. It means "name of God", deriving from the Hebrew Shem + ʾĒl.
From Wikipedia
In Pythagorean numerology, every letter has a value from 1 to 9. Adding the letters of Samuel yields these three numbers — a playful read on the name's character.
Samuel's best-ever rank, #17, was already achieved in 1880 — the very first year the SSA data covers — meaning by the time this dataset starts recording, the name had already peaked positionally and everything since has been a name holding on rather than climbing. Its raw count peaked much later, 14,813 births in 2001, but even that high point never matched the name's relative dominance from 1880.
Today's 8,310 births in 2024 is down 25% from a decade earlier, a decline shared with several long-standing names in this range rather than anything specific to Samuel.
The famous-bearer list runs almost entirely through 18th- and 19th-century letters — lexicographer Samuel Johnson, poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge, telegraph inventor Samuel Morse — with Mark Twain (born Samuel Clemens) as the closest thing to a household name. That's a narrower, more literary cluster than most names this size carry, most of them born well before the 20th century.
Why did you choose this name — or what does it mean to you? Approved stories appear on this page.
→ See names similar to Samuel · Compare Samuel with another name → · Popular names of the 2000s · Boys names starting with S
Rank is among all boys' names registered that year.
| Year | Babies | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1880 | 1,024 | #17 |
| 1881 | 919 | #17 |
| 1882 | 1,003 | #17 |
| 1883 | 937 | #17 |
| 1884 | 945 | #17 |
| 1885 | 888 | #18 |
| 1886 | 870 | #18 |
| 1887 | 802 | #18 |
| 1888 | 931 | #18 |
| 1889 | 810 | #20 |
| 1890 | 815 | #20 |
| 1891 | 753 | #20 |
| 1892 | 902 | #20 |
| 1893 | 851 | #20 |
| 1894 | 776 | #26 |
| 1895 | 814 | #25 |
| 1896 | 734 | #31 |
| 1897 | 759 | #28 |
| 1898 | 749 | #32 |
| 1899 | 704 | #30 |
| 1900 | 877 | #33 |
| 1901 | 628 | #33 |
| 1902 | 702 | #33 |
| 1903 | 741 | #31 |
| 1904 | 727 | #34 |
| 1905 | 856 | #30 |
| 1906 | 783 | #33 |
| 1907 | 892 | #32 |
| 1908 | 960 | #33 |
| 1909 | 983 | #32 |
| 1910 | 1,129 | #32 |
| 1911 | 1,398 | #30 |
| 1912 | 2,602 | #30 |
| 1913 | 2,850 | #36 |
| 1914 | 3,703 | #36 |
| 1915 | 4,351 | #39 |
| 1916 | 4,399 | #41 |
| 1917 | 4,490 | #42 |
| 1918 | 4,772 | #43 |
| 1919 | 4,472 | #43 |
| 1920 | 4,654 | #44 |
| 1921 | 4,754 | #44 |
| 1922 | 4,600 | #43 |
| 1923 | 4,578 | #45 |
| 1924 | 4,592 | #45 |
| 1925 | 4,405 | #46 |
| 1926 | 4,179 | #48 |
| 1927 | 4,189 | #49 |
| 1928 | 3,844 | #52 |
| 1929 | 3,567 | #53 |
| 1930 | 3,531 | #55 |
| 1931 | 3,379 | #56 |
| 1932 | 3,411 | #56 |
| 1933 | 3,111 | #61 |
| 1934 | 3,137 | #66 |
| 1935 | 3,149 | #62 |
| 1936 | 2,893 | #67 |
| 1937 | 3,027 | #66 |
| 1938 | 3,243 | #62 |
| 1939 | 3,254 | #63 |
| 1940 | 3,362 | #65 |
| 1941 | 3,537 | #65 |
| 1942 | 4,190 | #59 |
| 1943 | 4,142 | #62 |
| 1944 | 3,946 | #62 |
| 1945 | 3,957 | #62 |
| 1946 | 4,524 | #70 |
| 1947 | 5,109 | #72 |
| 1948 | 5,003 | #70 |
| 1949 | 5,357 | #62 |
| 1950 | 5,226 | #62 |
| 1951 | 5,476 | #67 |
| 1952 | 5,648 | #67 |
| 1953 | 5,423 | #70 |
| 1954 | 5,634 | #71 |
| 1955 | 5,534 | #71 |
| 1956 | 5,584 | #74 |
| 1957 | 5,237 | #82 |
| 1958 | 5,051 | #85 |
| 1959 | 4,953 | #86 |
| 1960 | 4,711 | #91 |
| 1961 | 4,666 | #89 |
| 1962 | 4,552 | #88 |
| 1963 | 4,522 | #87 |
| 1964 | 4,463 | #86 |
| 1965 | 4,394 | #84 |
| 1966 | 4,158 | #81 |
| 1967 | 4,232 | #69 |
| 1968 | 4,121 | #66 |
| 1969 | 4,431 | #64 |
| 1970 | 4,559 | #62 |
| 1971 | 4,406 | #66 |
| 1972 | 4,214 | #66 |
| 1973 | 4,266 | #66 |
| 1974 | 4,671 | #60 |
| 1975 | 4,621 | #61 |
| 1976 | 5,026 | #59 |
| 1977 | 5,259 | #60 |
| 1978 | 5,393 | #57 |
| 1979 | 5,688 | #55 |
| 1980 | 6,013 | #54 |
| 1981 | 6,037 | #54 |
| 1982 | 6,017 | #56 |
| 1983 | 6,195 | #54 |
| 1984 | 6,361 | #55 |
| 1985 | 7,010 | #54 |
| 1986 | 7,580 | #52 |
| 1987 | 8,576 | #50 |
| 1988 | 9,564 | #45 |
| 1989 | 10,107 | #47 |
| 1990 | 10,892 | #45 |
| 1991 | 11,232 | #39 |
| 1992 | 11,345 | #40 |
| 1993 | 11,710 | #37 |
| 1994 | 12,146 | #33 |
| 1995 | 12,440 | #33 |
| 1996 | 13,629 | #30 |
| 1997 | 14,237 | #27 |
| 1998 | 13,912 | #28 |
| 1999 | 14,049 | #27 |
| 2000 | 14,187 | #28 |
| 2001 | 14,813 | #26 |
| 2002 | 14,579 | #25 |
| 2003 | 14,687 | #23 |
| 2004 | 14,128 | #23 |
| 2005 | 14,269 | #21 |
| 2006 | 13,645 | #25 |
| 2007 | 13,366 | #25 |
| 2008 | 12,773 | #27 |
| 2009 | 12,175 | #24 |
| 2010 | 11,971 | #24 |
| 2011 | 11,366 | #26 |
| 2012 | 11,468 | #25 |
| 2013 | 11,139 | #25 |
| 2014 | 11,024 | #23 |
| 2015 | 10,900 | #23 |
| 2016 | 10,615 | #21 |
| 2017 | 10,447 | #21 |
| 2018 | 9,850 | #21 |
| 2019 | 9,321 | #22 |
| 2020 | 8,585 | #25 |
| 2021 | 8,573 | #23 |
| 2022 | 8,414 | #19 |
| 2023 | 8,019 | #19 |
| 2024 | 8,310 | #17 |
