Name Awesome

Read

Boys' name

To clear out, through Reed

Read has been given to 308 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 1949, with 14 recorded.

Babies named Read, 2014

1 in 741,000

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Read: meaning, origin, and history

To clear out, through Reed

surname transfer

What Read means

Read belongs to the name family reached through Read → Reed. Its meaning is “to clear out”.

Origin, language, and formation

Read is used in English. Its origins include surname transfer.

Read is recorded as a surname transferred into given-name use.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Reed.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 308 boys were recorded with the name Read between 1914 and 2014. Its highest annual count was 14 in 1949; its best national rank was #2,097 in 1949.

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 Read?

Read had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2014, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2014
1 in 741,000
5 of 3,706,812 births
Among boys only
1 in 384,000
<0.01% of boys
Rank, 2014
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
513,874 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Read 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 2014 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 513,874 children born in 2014 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Read. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Reads were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Read was born before 1966 — so the typical Read is around 59 today.

Median birth year
1966
About 59 years old
Biggest decade
1990s
17.2% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
30.5%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
212
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1990s — 17.2% of all recorded uses (53).

Is Read 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 1949 (14)
Years since peak
76
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
23.1% average annual change
Best rank ever
#2,097
1949

Spellings of Read

Read is not the most common spelling — Ryan is, with 31.5% against Read's 0.01%.

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.

Read around the world

Where Read 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.

  • France
    1980–1980
    #2,816
    in 1980

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0.

Read 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
#2,097
1949
Peak year
1949
14 that year
First recorded
1914
Last recorded
2014
All-time count
308
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Read

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

RealReasonReaReadeReaceFreadReaseMeadReavesReazonReagenReacherReaganReakwonReauxReavisGileadReasynReafordReazynArmsteadRealmReamerCread

Sibling names for Read

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 Read

Top names of 1949, Read's peak yearThe 1940s in fullOther names that peaked in 1949Boys' names starting with R