Name Awesome

Herb

Boys' name

Short form of Herbert

Herb has been given to 2,007 babies in the U.S. since 1884. 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 1947, with 70 recorded.

Babies named Herb, 1993

1 in 628,000

Herb over time, 1880–2025

Boys
02040608018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Herb: meaning, origin, and history

Short form of Herbert

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Herb means

Herb is a short form of Herbert.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Herb is used in English.

Another recorded pronunciation is /ˈhɜɹb/ and /ˈhɜːb/ for Herb.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Herb → Herbert. The family’s meaning is “army + bright”, recorded in the naming reference for Herbert.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Herbert.

Pronunciation and spelling

In English, Herb is pronounced /hɜː(ɹ)b/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 2,007 boys were recorded with the name Herb between 1884 and 1993. Its highest annual count was 70 in 1947; its best national rank was #791 in 1941.

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 Herb?

Herb had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 1993, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 1993
1 in 628,000
6 of 3,768,729 births
Among boys only
1 in 327,000
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 1993
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
435,382 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Herb 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 1993 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 435,382 children born in 1993 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Herb. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Herbs were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Herb was born before 1946 — so the typical Herb is around 79 today.

Median birth year
1946
About 79 years old
Biggest decade
1940s
26.5% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
8.2%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
844
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1940s — 26.5% of all recorded uses (531).

Is Herb 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 1947 (70)
Years since peak
78
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
18.4% average annual change
Best rank ever
#791
1941

Spellings of Herb

Herb is not the most common spelling — Henry is, with 89.9% against Herb's 0.23%.

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 Herb is used

Across 1910–2025, Herb was most concentrated in California — about 1 in 100,000 boys, against 1 in 214,899 across all states with data. It was least common in Texas (1 in —).

01 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1California1 in 100,000
  2. 2Illinois1 in 100,000
  3. 3Kansas1 in 100,000
  4. 4Ohio1 in 100,000
  5. 5Washington1 in 100,000
  6. 6Michigan1 in —
  7. 7Minnesota1 in —
  8. 8Missouri1 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. Herb has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Herb around the world

Where Herb 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
    2002–2022
    #4,790
    in 2022
  • South Australia
    1975–1975
    #460
    in 1975

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Notable people named Herb

People whose public names include Herb, 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.

Herb 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
#791
1941
Peak year
1947
70 that year
First recorded
1884
Last recorded
1993
All-time count
2,007
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Herb

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

HeroHershHeronHeruHershyHernanHermesHersonHerbyHerveHerveyHerbieHerculesHeriHermonHeraldHershelHeroldHershellHernyHermannHerseyHerminioHershal

Names with a curve like Herb

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

GeroldWindellArlynLindellNancyGearldDelmasBarbaraDonnaGaylenDeraldLynwood

Sibling names for Herb

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 Herb

Top names of 1947, Herb's peak yearThe 1940s in fullOther names that peaked in 1941Boys' names starting with H