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New Research Shows the Most Popular Baby Name, and It's Not Olivia
The Social Security Administration has been publishing its highly anticipated Top Baby Names list every year for the last nearly 30 years, and since its debut in 1997, the list has inspired people all over the world to name their newborns with the trendiest titles in mind. In 2025, naming baby girls Olivia, Emma, and Amelia, and little boys Liam, Noah, and Oliver became the norm as a result. However, new research reveals that the SSA got it wrong when it comes to the most popular baby girl names of 2024.
On June 5, Nameberry (AKA 'the world's largest baby naming site') debuted its 2024 Playground Analysis. According to the site's research, Sophia (Sofia and Sofiya) is the most popular girl's name, followed by Amelia (Emelia, Emilia, and Amilia) and Olivia (Alivia and Alyvia). The top three most popular boys' names, however, remain the same, with Liam on top, and Noah and Oliver coming in for second and third.
'The Social Security Administration differentiates and ranks names based on spelling, while Nameberry's Playground Analysis groups names according to sound, because when you're on the playground, Luca with a C is virtually the same as Luka with a K,' Nameberry writer Emma Waterhouse explained in a recent TikTok. 'My colleague Kelly combined all the variant spellings of names into groups, and then ranked the groups to get the real top baby names of 2024… The hardest part of The Playground Analysis is deciding which names to group together because many names have multiple pronunciations. But, as a whole, The Playground Analysis is much more reflective of the names you're actually hearing out and about than the SSA stats are.'
As creative as Nameberry's approach to determining the top names of the year is, many TikTokers were simply too distracted by the many spellings shown in the video, which depicted the top 20 baby names for boys and girls, to care.
'Spelling it Charlette should be a Class A felony,' one TikToker commented on the video. 'Absolutely bone-chilled and shocked to see 'Madelyn' used as the base spelling,' another person remarked. 'I can't believe they made up six ways to spell Jackson,' someone else chimed in.
Spelling aside, some TikTokers did take the time to applaud the grouping system, while others agreed that deciding which names go together is quite tricky. 'The fact that previous analysis didn't think to combine different spelling variations… like, who designed that?' one person remarked.
Needless to say, if you've ever wondered where some of the names in your kiddo's class originated, these in-depth name analyses shed some light. 'My son is 11. There were six Aidens in his class of 21 kids this year,' one TikToker revealed. 'Nooo—I thought the Aiden and Caden reign of terror was over,' someone else exclaimed.
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