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Harvard

#7,861 in 2025Boys' name

Army + guard, through Hereweard

Harvard has been given to 614 babies in the U.S. since 1912. In 2025 it ranked #7,861 of 13,926 boys’ names in use. Its peak year was 1915, with 27 recorded.

Babies named Harvard, 2025

1 in 332,000

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Harvard: meaning, origin, and history

Army + guard, through Hereweard

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Harvard means

Harvard belongs to the name family reached through Harvard → Hereweard. Its meaning is “army + guard”.

Dictionary etymologyReferences, data & attribution

A variant of Harward reflecting the merger of /v/ and /w/ in the dialects of southeastern England; thus from Middle English Herward, Herreward, itself from Old English Hereweard and a doublet of Harward and Hereward.

Excerpt from Wiktionary: Harvard (English) · CC BY-SA 4.0

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Origin, language, and formation

Harvard is used in English.

Harvard comes through Middle English Herward and Old English Hereweard.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Harward, Hereward, Herwarth and Hereweard.

Pronunciation and spelling

In English, Harvard is pronounced /ˈhɑɹvəɹd/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 614 boys were recorded with the name Harvard between 1912 and 2025. Its highest annual count was 27 in 1915; its best national rank was #1,129 in 1913.

How common is Harvard?

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

Among all babies, 2025
1 in 332,000
10 of 3,315,165 births
Among boys only
1 in 171,000
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 2025
#7,861
of 13,926 boys’ names in use
Coin-flip room size
229,791 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Harvard 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 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 229,791 children born in 2025 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Harvard. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Harvards were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Harvard was born before 1931 — so the typical Harvard is around 94 today.

Median birth year
1931
About 94 years old
Biggest decade
1920s
22.5% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
7.0%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
116
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1920s — 22.5% of all recorded uses (138).

Is Harvard 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
37.0%
Peak was 1915 (27)
Years since peak
110
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
26.5% average annual change
Best rank ever
#1,129
1913

Spellings of Harvard

Harvard is not the most common spelling — Harland is, with 44.0% against Harvard's 4.7%.

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 Harvard is used

Across 1910–2025, Harvard was most concentrated in New York — about 1 in — boys, against 1 in 2,664,768 across all states with data.

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1New York1 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. Harvard has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Harvard around the world

Where Harvard 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.

  • South Australia
    1993–2006
    #657
    in 2006

Popularity data from Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Harvard by the numbers

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

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
#7,861
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
New entry
Best rank ever
#1,129
1913
Peak year
1915
27 that year
First recorded
1912
Last recorded
2025
All-time count
614
Count in 2025
10

Names similar to Harvard

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

HardingHarvestHartwellHartleyHardenHaraldHartfordHarlynHarborHarounGerrardHarmanHarukiHardinHarutoHarvinHarjotHarlessHarshivHaroonReshardHarroldHarwoodHarlon

Sibling names for Harvard

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 Harvard

Top names of 1915, Harvard's peak yearThe 1910s in fullOther names that peaked in 1913Boys' names starting with H