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Knute

#7,976 in 2025Boys' name

Variant of Knut

Knute has been given to 691 babies in the U.S. since 1880. In 2025 it ranked #7,976 of 13,926 boys’ names in use. Its peak year was 1931, with 19 recorded.

Babies named Knute, 2025

1 in 332,000

Knute over time, 1880–2025

Boys
0510152018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Knute: meaning, origin, and history

Variant of Knut

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Knute means

Knute is a variant of Knut.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Knute → Knut. The family’s meaning is “knot”, recorded in Norwegian Bokmål with the source elements knútr.

Origin, language, and formation

Knute is used in English.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Knut.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 691 boys were recorded with the name Knute between 1880 and 2025. Its highest annual count was 19 in 1931; its best national rank was #874 in 1893.

Over 10 years its rank rose, from #13,162 in 2015 to #7,976 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 Knute?

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
#7,976
of 13,926 boys’ names in use
Coin-flip room size
229,791 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Knute 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 Knute. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Knutes were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Knute was born before 1948 — so the typical Knute is around 77 today.

Median birth year
1948
About 77 years old
Biggest decade
1950s
16.6% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
8.1%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
340
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1950s — 16.6% of all recorded uses (115).

Is Knute 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
+5,186
Places climbed
Births vs 10 years ago
2.00×
More babies than then
Share of its own peak
52.6%
Peak was 1931 (19)
Years since peak
94
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
24.5% average annual change
Best rank ever
#874
1893

Spellings of Knute

Knute is not the most common spelling — Nate is, with 61.5% against Knute's 9.5%.

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 Knute is used

Across 1910–2025, Knute 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. Knute has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Knute around the world

Where Knute 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
    1971–1971
    #512
    in 1971

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

Knute by the numbers

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

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
#7,976
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
New entry
Best rank ever
#874
1893
Peak year
1931
19 that year
First recorded
1880
Last recorded
2025
All-time count
691
Count in 2025
10

Names similar to Knute

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

KnutNuteLute

Sibling names for Knute

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 Knute

Top names of 1931, Knute's peak yearThe 1930s in fullOther names that peaked in 1893Boys' names starting with K