Name Awesome

Erle

Boys' name

Nobleman, through Earl

Erle has been given to 855 babies in the U.S. since 1882. 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 1917, with 28 recorded.

Babies named Erle, 1981

1 in 692,000

Erle over time, 1880–2025

Boys
010203018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Erle: meaning, origin, and history

Nobleman, through Earl

English

What Erle means

Erle belongs to the name family reached through Erle → Earl. Its meaning is “nobleman”.

Origin, language, and formation

Erle is used in English and Norwegian. Its origins include English.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Earl and Erling.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 855 boys were recorded with the name Erle between 1882 and 1981. Its highest annual count was 28 in 1917; its best national rank was #794 in 1891.

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 Erle?

Erle had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 1981, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 1981
1 in 692,000
5 of 3,459,130 births
Among boys only
1 in 358,000
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 1981
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
479,538 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Erle 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 1981 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 479,538 children born in 1981 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Erle. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Erles were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Erle was born before 1933 — so the typical Erle is around 92 today.

Median birth year
1933
About 92 years old
Biggest decade
1920s
21.8% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
16.4%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
230
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1920s — 21.8% of all recorded uses (186).

Is Erle 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 1917 (28)
Years since peak
108
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
29.7% average annual change
Best rank ever
#794
1891

Spellings of Erle

Erle is not the most common spelling — Eric is, with 32.5% against Erle's 0.03%.

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.

Where Erle is used

Across 1910–2025, Erle was most concentrated in Minnesota — about 1 in — boys, against 1 in 640,270 across all states with data.

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Minnesota1 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. Erle has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Erle around the world

Where Erle 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
    1973–2016
    #6,427
    in 2016

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0.

Erle 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
#794
1891
Peak year
1917
28 that year
First recorded
1882
Last recorded
1981
All-time count
855
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Erle

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

ErlinErlingErlandMyrleCarleVerleCharleBerleMurleErlanErlonPerleMerleEarleBurleDarleKarleMearleByrleErlisDerleSearleHarleTearle

Sibling names for Erle

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 Erle

Top names of 1917, Erle's peak yearThe 1910s in fullOther names that peaked in 1891Boys' names starting with E