Popularity of the name Susan, 1880–2025

Susan was at its most popular in 1954, when 47,162 girls were given the name: about 1 in 41 girls born in the U.S. that year, ranking #5. In 2025, 222 girls were named Susan, ranking #1,085. In all, Social Security counts 1,123,481 girls named Susan since 1880. Social Security’s records also list 2,541 boys named Susan.

Peak year

1954

Rank in 1954

#5

Babies in 1954

47,162

Rank in 2025

#1,085

Total since 1880

1,123,481

Where it stands now

Over the last ten years it has slipped from #911 in 2015 to #1,085 in 2025, with 301 girls named Susan in 2015 and 222 in 2025.

Decade by decade

Susan ranked highest in the 1960s, at #3, with 287,666 girls given the name that decade. It ranked #96 in the 1880s and #1,087 in the 2020s so far.

Every 20 years in the records: 286 in 1880 (#80), 410 in 1900 (#144), 850 in 1920 (#225), 6,756 in 1940 (#36), 39,208 in 1960 (#2), 4,704 in 1980 (#62), 693 in 2000 (#409) and 262 in 2020 (#972).

Highs and lows

The most girls given the name in a single year was 47,418, in 1955. That is not its peak year: Social Security’s records hold more girls for 1955 than for 1954, so the name’s share of births was smaller. Its best rank in any year was #2, first reached in 1957.

Every year

The table lists every year from 1880 to 2025 in which Social Security recorded at least 5 girls named Susan, with the name’s rank that year.

How these numbers are counted

Social Security publishes, for every year since 1880, how many babies of each sex were given each name, counting any name given to at least 5. A name’s rank is its place that year among names for the same sex, by number of babies. Names with the same count share a rank here, while Social Security’s own lists break ties alphabetically, so a rank can differ from theirs by a place or two. A name’s share is the number of babies given it divided by all babies of that sex in the data that year, and its peak is the year that share was highest. Shares rather than counts set the peak, because far more babies were born in some years than others: counting babies alone would pull nearly every name’s peak toward the 1946–1964 baby boom.

Source: the U.S. Social Security Administration’s national baby name data, from Social Security card applications for babies born in the U.S. A name is left out of a year when fewer than 5 babies of one sex got it, and counts before about 1937 are incomplete, because many people born then never applied for a card. See how Baby Boom builds its data. Figures may contain errors.