Name Awesome

Dov

#1,453 in 2025Boys' name

Bear

Dov has been given to 3,623 babies in the U.S. since 1949. In 2025 it ranked #1,453 of 13,926 boys’ names in use. Its peak year was 2022, with 160 recorded.

Babies named Dov, 2025

1 in 27,000

Dov over time, 1880–2025

Boys
05010015020018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Dov: meaning, origin, and history

Bear

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Dov means

Dov means “bear”, associated with dov.

Origin, language, and formation

Dov is used in English.

Dov comes through Hebrew דוב.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 3,623 boys were recorded with the name Dov between 1949 and 2025. Its highest annual count was 160 in 2022; its best national rank was #1,230 in 2022.

Over 5 years its rank rose, from #1,480 in 2020 to #1,453 in 2025. Over 10 years its rank fell, from #1,435 in 2015 to #1,453 in 2025.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Dov?

Everything below is computed from the 2025 data — the most recent year available.

Among all babies, 2025
1 in 27,000
123 of 3,315,165 births
Among boys only
1 in 13,900
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 2025
#1,453
of 13,926 boys’ names in use
Coin-flip room size
18,683 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Dov 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 2025 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 5002%

Put another way: gather 18,683 children born in 2025 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Dov. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Dovs were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Dov was born before 2011 — so the typical Dov is around 14 today.

Median birth year
2011
About 14 years old
Biggest decade
2010s
29.8% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
68.2%
A modern name
Recorded since 1950
3,614
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

2010s — 29.8% of all recorded uses (1,079).

Is Dov 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
−81
Places dropped
Rank vs 5 years ago
+27
Places climbed
Rank vs 10 years ago
−18
Places dropped
Births vs 10 years ago
1.03×
More babies than then
Share of its own peak
76.9%
Peak was 2022 (160)
Years since peak
3
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
16.5% average annual change
Best rank ever
#1,230
2022

Where Dov is used

Across 1910–2025, Dov was most concentrated in New York — about 1 in 6,250 boys, against 1 in 21,126 across all states with data. It was least common in Pennsylvania (1 in —).

016 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1New York1 in 6,250
  2. 2New Jersey1 in 6,667
  3. 3California1 in —
  4. 4Florida1 in —
  5. 5Illinois1 in —
  6. 6Maryland1 in —
  7. 7Pennsylvania1 in —

Shading is the share of that state's recorded boys given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Dov has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Dov around the world

Where Dov 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.

  • England & Wales
    1996–2025
    #2,952
    in 2025
  • France
    1962–2025
    #3,426
    in 2025
  • Canada
    1991–2023
    #2,436
    in 2023

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics, Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques and Statistics Canada. ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence.

Notable people named Dov

People whose public names include Dov, backed by Wikidata given-name records and ordered by linked Wikimedia pages. The name may be a middle name.

People data from Wikidata (CC0). Fame is measured, not judged — the order reflects how widely each person is documented, not the U.S. birth records popularity this page is otherwise about.

Dov in other languages

Cross-language forms and variants of Dov. Linked forms have their own page here.

BerDow

Variant forms from Wikidata (CC0). Most are used mainly outside the United States; U.S. birth records statistics cover US usage only.

Dov by the numbers

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

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
#1,453
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
Up 27
Best rank ever
#1,230
2022
Peak year
2022
160 that year
First recorded
1949
Last recorded
2025
All-time count
3,623
Count in 2025
123

Names similar to Dov

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

DovidDoviDovberDoverDovyDoveDovonDovudDovieDovanDovonte

Names with a curve like Dov

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Dov, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

AryehLazarusNikolaDaniloUmarArisIlanYakovEliyahuTzviYitzchokIsmail

Sibling names for Dov

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 Dov

Top names of 2022, Dov's peak yearThe 2020s in fullOther names that peaked in 2022Boys' names starting with D