Cliford

Boys' name

Meaning not yet documented

Cliford has been given to 286 babies in the U.S. since 1914. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1925, with 14 recorded.

Babies named Cliford, 1987

1 in 721,000

Cliford over time, 1880–2025

Boys
05101518801900192019401960198020002020

Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

How common is Cliford?

Cliford had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 1987, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 1987
1 in 721,000
5 of 3,605,072 births
Among boys only
1 in 373,000
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 1987
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
499,770 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Cliford sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Liam (20,818)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 1987 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 499,770 children born in 1987 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Cliford. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Clifords were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Cliford was born before 1930 — so the typical Cliford is around 95 today.

Median birth year
1930
About 95 years old
Biggest decade
1920s
36.0% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
7.7%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
46
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1920s — 36.0% of all recorded uses (103).

Is Cliford rising or falling?

Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.

Rank vs 1 year ago
—
Not ranked then
Rank vs 5 years ago
New entry
Not ranked then
Rank vs 10 years ago
—
Not ranked then
Births vs 10 years ago
—
Not published both years
Share of its own peak
0%
Peak was 1925 (14)
Years since peak
100
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
22.3% average annual change
Best rank ever
#2,211
1925

Spellings of Cliford

Cliford is not the most common spelling — Clifford is, with 96.7% against Cliford's 0.15%.

Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.

Cliford around the world

Where Cliford ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.

  • France
    1992–1992
    #3,317
    in 1992
  • South Australia
    1998–1998
    #534
    in 1998

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Cliford by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#2,211
1925
Peak year
1925
14 that year
First recorded
1914
Last recorded
1987
All-time count
286
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Cliford

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

Sibling names for Cliford

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Cliford