Humanverse

Ferdinand vs Fermin

American parents have registered 8,909 Ferdinands since 1880, against 4,832 Fermins. But in 2025 it was Fermin that was commoner, 28 babies to 24.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Ferdinand against Fermin, 1880 to 2025 0 80 160 240 320 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Ferdinand Fermin

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, Ferdinand for 91 years and Fermin for 55 years. The lead changed hands 9 times.

Side by side

  Ferdinand Fermin
Total US births 8,9094,832
Most in one year 25986
Babies in 2025 2428
Estimated living today 2,8003,700
Median age today 5334
Peak year 19181993
Best rank 363rd boys1,216th boys
Rank in 2025 4,249th3,848th
First recorded 18801910
Girls / boys 0 / 8,9090 / 4,832

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 Ferdinands alive today are over 53; half the Fermins are over 34. That is 19 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.

Both names abroad

Countries whose statistics office publishes both names, so the comparison can be made somewhere other than the United States.

Country Ferdinand Fermin
France 16,37020

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: Ferdinand and Fermin.