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Cecelia vs Cecilio

American parents have registered 60,530 Cecelias since 1880, against 2,411 Cecilios. Cecelia is still ahead, with 569 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Cecelia against Cecilio, 1880 to 2025 0 250 500 750 1k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Cecelia Cecilio

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

Cecelia has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1880 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 1977, when Cecelia had 130 and Cecilio had 36.

Side by side

  Cecelia Cecilio
Total US births 60,5302,411
Most in one year 93539
Babies in 2025 5699
Estimated living today 33,0001,800
Median age today 4540
Peak year 19181998
Best rank 204th girls2,274th boys
Rank in 2025 529th8,243rd
First recorded 18801909
Girls / boys 60,519 / 110 / 2,411

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 Cecelias alive today are over 45; half the Cecilios are over 40. That is 5 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Where each one is strongest

How much commoner the name is in that state than it is nationally, from births recorded since 1910.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

Social Security Administration birth records, 1880–2025, public domain. Full histories: Cecelia and Cecilio.