Humanverse

Dash vs Dashel

American parents have registered 4,384 Dashes since 1880, against 698 Dashels. Dash is still ahead, with 207 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Dash against Dashel, 1880 to 2025 0 100 200 300 400 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Dash Dashel

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 32 years in which either name was published, Dash for 31 years and Dashel for 1 year. The lead changed hands 2 times.

Side by side

  Dash Dashel
Total US births 4,384698
Most in one year 32753
Babies in 2025 20714
Estimated living today 4,400690
Median age today 711
Peak year 20172009
Best rank 741st boys2,401st boys
Rank in 2025 1,056th6,143rd
First recorded 19841995
Girls / boys 87 / 4,2976 / 692

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 Dashels alive today are over 11; half the Dashes are over 7. That is 4 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: Dash and Dashel.