Little
UnisexBoys' nameGirls' nameMeaning not yet documented
Little has been given to 1,791 babies in the U.S. since 1883. 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 1975, with 32 recorded. It's used for both sexes: 88% boys, 12% girls all-time.
Babies named Little, 2017
1 in 715,000
Little over time, 1880–2025
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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.
Girls or boys — Little over time
In 2017, Little went to 0% girls and 100% boys.
A sex is only published in years it reached five applications, so a stretch at 0% or 100% means the other side stayed under that floor — not that it was never used.
How common is Little?
Little had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2017, the last year it was published.
- Among all babies, 2017
- 1 in 715,000
- 5 of 3,577,106 births
- Among boys only
- 1 in 370,000
- <0.01% of boys
- Rank, 2017
- Unranked
- Fewer than 5 uses
- Coin-flip room size
- 495,893 kids
- Even odds of a second one
Where Little sits on the popularity scale
Chance at least one other child shares the name
If the other children were drawn at random from the 2017 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.
Put another way: gather 495,893 children born in 2017 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Little. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.
When Littles were born
Half of everyone ever recorded as Little was born before 1956 — so the typical Little is around 69 today.
- Biggest decade
- 1970s
- 15.8% of all use
- Born in the last 25 years
- 5.4%
- Mostly a past generation
- Recorded since 1950
- 889
- People you could plausibly meet
1970s — 15.8% of all recorded uses (248).
Is Little 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 1975 (32)
- Years since peak
- 50
- Years
- Year-to-year steadiness
- Volatile
- 34.9% average annual change
Spellings of Little
Little is the most-used spelling, taking 74.3% of the 2,116 babies given a near-identical spelling.
- Little74.3%1,573
- Lisle25.7%543
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 Little is used
Across 1910–2025, Little was most concentrated in Georgia — about 1 in 100,000 boys, against 1 in 304,719 across all states with data. It was least common in Texas (1 in —).
Most concentrated
- 1Georgia1 in 100,000
- 2Mississippi1 in 100,000
- 3Alabama1 in —
- 4Florida1 in —
- 5South Carolina1 in —
- 6Texas1 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. Little has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.
Little around the world
Where Little 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 Australia1955–2000#556in 2000
Popularity data from Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.
Little by the numbers
The raw record for each sex the name is used for.
As a boy's name
Names similar to Little
Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.
Sibling names for Little
Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.