Boy Names That Start With B
Boys' names beginning with B, ranked by how many babies actually got them — not by editorial preference — plus which ones are climbing and how the letter itself has moved.
- Share of boys, 2025
- 4.9%
- vs 5.4% in 2000
- Names in use
- 582
- 1,868 recorded since 1880
- Letter peaked
- 1985
- at 6.5% of names
- Rank among 26 letters
- #8
- by 2025 share
How B has fared since 1880
Share of all listed U.S. births given a name starting with B, year by year. Plotted as a share rather than a count — raw counts track how many babies were born, so every letter would appear to peak in 1957.
| Save name | Name & meaning | History 1926–2025, yearly counts; individually scaled | Babies 2025 · rank | 5-year rank movement | Peak year |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 979#339 | Down 68 rank positions in five years | 1972 | |||
| 9,762#11 | Down 4 rank positions in five years | 1989 | |||
| 1,326#261 | Down 96 rank positions in five years | 1992 | |||
| 1,005#336 | Down 77 rank positions in five years | 1985 | |||
| 558#536 | Down 38 rank positions in five years | 1956 | |||
| 794#403 | Down 130 rank positions in five years | 1980 | |||
| 1,080#316 | Down 107 rank positions in five years | 2012 | |||
| 1,545#229 | Down 118 rank positions in five years | 2010 | |||
| 919#357 | Down 123 rank positions in five years | 2000 | |||
| 1,071#321 | Down 17 rank positions in five years | 2007 | |||
| 2,416#152 | Down 37 rank positions in five years | 2017 | |||
| 1,492#236 | Down 58 rank positions in five years | 2008 | |||
| 6,268#40 | Up 61 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 2,131#172 | Down 41 rank positions in five years | 2014 | |||
| 5,165#60 | Up 49 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 1,649#215 | Down 74 rank positions in five years | 2012 | |||
| 4,877#64 | Up 28 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 293#841 | Up 303 rank positions in five years | 1948 | |||
| 306#810 | Down 123 rank positions in five years | 2003 | |||
| 2,138#171 | Up 22 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 606#499 | Down 266 rank positions in five years | 2014 | |||
| 2,518#141 | Up 69 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 2,185#168 | Up 80 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 351#740 | Down 28 rank positions in five years | 2022 | |||
| 334#768 | Up 90 rank positions in five years | 2006 | |||
| 698#449 | Up 91 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 1,214#279 | Up 273 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 1,301#265 | Up 30 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 366#725 | Down 224 rank positions in five years | 2011 | |||
| 1,292#266 | Up 129 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 451#620 | Down 26 rank positions in five years | 2014 | |||
| 305#814 | Up 255 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 921#356 | Up 84 rank positions in five years | 2024 | |||
| 822#386 | Up 72 rank positions in five years | 2024 | |||
| 1,249#275 | Up 337 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 326#781 | Up 61 rank positions in five years | 2015 | |||
| 1,640#217 | Up 307 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 762#423 | Up 158 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 383#701 | Up 230 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 1,099#310 | Up 443 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 397#686 | Up 71 rank positions in five years | 2023 | |||
| 320#790 | Up 523 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 298#829 | Down 52 rank positions in five years | 2024 | |||
| 333#769 | Up 54 rank positions in five years | 2023 | |||
| 347#748 | Up 73 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 405#672 | Up 101 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 349#744 | Down 128 rank positions in five years | 2021 | |||
| 374#721 | Up 13 rank positions in five years | 2021 | |||
| 382#704 | Up 1,013 rank positions in five years | 2025 | |||
| 310#804 | Up 1,111 rank positions in five years | 2025 |
Page 1 of 1
B names climbing fastest
Biggest B names of all time
By total applications since 1880 — a different list from the one above, because it counts every generation, not just this one.
Every other letter
Sources & methodology
Rankings and counts come from official birth card-application data, 1880–2025. Counts are card applications rather than births, and any name given to fewer than 5 babies of one sex in a year is not published — so “—” means genuinely uncommon, never invalid. The “climbing fastest” row ranks by five-year rank movement as a ratio, and a name must be inside the top 1,000 with at least 200 applications in 2025 to qualify — a looser gate than the site-wide trending list uses, because inside a single letter the stricter one leaves some letters empty. Letter shares are measured over listed names only, and the 25-year comparison is a generation rather than five years because letter fashion moves far more slowly than any one name.