Humanverse

Cloud vs Cloyd

American parents have registered 3,050 Cloyds since 1880, against 776 Clouds. But in 2025 it was Cloud that was commoner, 39 babies to fewer than five.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Cloud against Cloyd, 1880 to 2025 0 25 50 75 100 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Cloud Cloyd

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 131 years in which either name was published, Cloyd for 106 years and Cloud for 25 years. The lead changed hands once.

Side by side

  Cloud Cloyd
Total US births 7763,050
Most in one year 5591
Babies in 2025 39under 5
Estimated living today 680680
Median age today 771
Peak year 20201918
Best rank 2,546th boys645th boys
Rank in 2025 3,089thunranked
First recorded 19131880
Girls / boys 26 / 7500 / 3,050

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 Cloyds alive today are over 71; half the Clouds are over 7. That is 64 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: Cloud and Cloyd.