Harley vs Harrison
American parents have registered 99,462 Harrisons since 1880, against 71,872 Harleys. Harrison is still ahead, with 3,080 babies in 2025.
Babies given each name, 1880–2025
Harley Harrison
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, Harley for 86 years and Harrison for 60 years. The lead changed hands 19 times.
- 1883–1885 Harley ahead
- 1886–1896 Harrison ahead
- 1899–1982 Harley ahead, apart from 3 short spells
- 1983–1992 Harrison ahead
- 1993–1995 Harley ahead
- 1996–2025 Harrison ahead
11 shorter spells of a year or two are folded into the spans above rather than listed separately.
Side by side
| Harley | Harrison | |
|---|---|---|
| Total US births | 71,872 | 99,462 |
| Most in one year | 1,933 | 3,670 |
| Babies in 2025 | 947 | 3,080 |
| Estimated living today | 55,000 | 86,000 |
| Median age today | 20 | 13 |
| Peak year | 1994 | 2016 |
| Best rank | 322nd boys | 107th boys |
| Rank in 2025 | 1,081st | 116th |
| First recorded | 1880 | 1880 |
| Girls / boys | 31,167 / 40,705 | 324 / 99,138 |
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 Harleys alive today are over 20; half the Harrisons are over 13. That is 7 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.
Where each one is strongest
- Harley Oklahoma (2.4×), West Virginia (2.2×), South Dakota (1.9×)
- Harrison Utah (1.7×), Georgia (1.6×), New Hampshire (1.5×)
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 | Harley | Harrison |
|---|---|---|
| England and Wales | 25,857 | 46,965 |
| New Zealand | 663 | 3,416 |
| Scotland | 1,314 | 2,660 |
| Ireland | 474 | 769 |
| Northern Ireland | 408 | 565 |
| France | 285 | 445 |
| Belgium | 23 | 22 |
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: Harley and Harrison.