Name Awesome

Hy

Boys' name

Life, through Hyman

Hy has been given to 117 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 1915, with 11 recorded.

Babies named Hy, 2024

1 in 669,000

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Hy: meaning, origin, and history

Life, through Hyman

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Hy means

Hy belongs to the name family reached through Hy → Hyman. Its meaning is “life”.

Origin, language, and formation

Hy is used in English.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Hyman.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 117 boys were recorded with the name Hy between 1914 and 2024. Its highest annual count was 11 in 1915; its best national rank was #2,350 in 1914.

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 Hy?

Hy had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2024, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2024
1 in 669,000
5 of 3,342,801 births
Among boys only
1 in 345,000
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 2024
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
463,412 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Hy 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 2024 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 463,412 children born in 2024 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Hy. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Hys were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Hy was born before 1997 — so the typical Hy is around 28 today.

Median birth year
1997
About 28 years old
Biggest decade
1910s
29.1% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
45.3%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
77
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1910s — 29.1% of all recorded uses (34).

Is Hy 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 1915 (11)
Years since peak
110
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
21.4% average annual change
Best rank ever
#2,350
1914

Where Hy is used

Across 1910–2025, Hy was most concentrated in California — about 1 in — boys, against 1 in 1,809,208 across all states with data. It was least common in New York (1 in —).

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1California1 in —
  2. 2New 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. Hy has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Hy around the world

Where Hy 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
    1998–2013
    #499
    in 2013

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

Hy 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
#2,350
1914
Peak year
1915
11 that year
First recorded
1914
Last recorded
2024
All-time count
117
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Hy

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

HyunHydeHyderHylanKhyHyattHymieHylandHykeemHyramHydenShyHymenMoishyArchyRichyJakhyRithyWorthyHeshyHyrumCathyDorthyVuthy

Sibling names for Hy

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 Hy

Top names of 1915, Hy's peak yearThe 1910s in fullOther names that peaked in 1914Boys' names starting with H