Carol vs Carolyn
American parents have registered 825,584 Carols since 1880, against 558,397 Carolyns. But in 2025 it was Carolyn that was commoner, 185 babies to 82.
Babies given each name, 1880–2025
Carol Carolyn
Each line is every baby given the name that year, girls and boys added together — the only count that means the same thing for both names. A line breaks where the name fell below five babies in a year — the point at which the SSA stops publishing it — rather than being drawn through a figure nobody published. A single published year in a gap shows as a dot.
Who was ahead
Of the 146 years in which either name was published, Carolyn for 98 years and Carol for 48 years. The lead changed hands 2 times.
Side by side
| Carol | Carolyn | |
|---|---|---|
| Total US births | 825,584 | 558,397 |
| Most in one year | 34,458 | 20,788 |
| Babies in 2025 | 82 | 185 |
| Estimated living today | 525,000 | 360,000 |
| Median age today | 73 | 71 |
| Peak year | 1946 | 1947 |
| Best rank | 5th girls | 15th girls |
| Rank in 2025 | 2,239th | 1,222nd |
| First recorded | 1880 | 1880 |
| Girls / boys | 816,928 / 8,656 | 556,777 / 1,620 |
A rank is a position within one sex’s list for one year, so the two rank rows are not subtracted from one another and the winning column is not marked on them. The living figure is a life-table estimate, not a count.
Which name is older
Half of the Carols alive today are over 73; half the Carolyns are over 71. That is 2 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.
Where each one is strongest
- Carol South Dakota (1.8×), North Dakota (1.8×), Rhode Island (1.7×)
- Carolyn Arkansas (2.1×), West Virginia (2.0×), the District of Columbia (1.8×)
How much commoner the name is in that state than it is nationally, from births recorded since 1910.
Both names abroad
Countries whose statistics office publishes both names, so the comparison can be made somewhere other than the United States.
| Country | Carol | Carolyn |
|---|---|---|
| New Zealand | 3,626 | 3,212 |
| Ireland | 5,111 | 498 |
| France | 3,455 | 400 |
| Scotland | 2,645 | 921 |
| England and Wales | 256 | 150 |
| Belgium | 7 | 12 |
| Northern Ireland | 7 | 11 |
Every spelling a country files separately is added together, over whatever years that country publishes — which is not the same range in any two of them, so read the columns against each other and not the rows.
Compare something else
Related comparisons
Social Security Administration birth records, 1880–2025, public domain. Full histories: Carol and Carolyn.