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Janice vs Janie

American parents have registered 407,605 Janices since 1880, against 75,874 Janies. But in 2025 it was Janie that was commoner, 168 babies to 70.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Janice against Janie, 1880 to 2025 0 4k 8k 12k 16k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Janice Janie

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, Janice for 99 years and Janie for 47 years. The lead changed hands 2 times.

Side by side

  Janice Janie
Total US births 407,60575,874
Most in one year 15,9811,853
Babies in 2025 70168
Estimated living today 273,00042,000
Median age today 7166
Peak year 19511947
Best rank 21st girls161st girls
Rank in 2025 2,514th1,326th
First recorded 18941880
Girls / boys 406,448 / 1,15775,598 / 276

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 Janices alive today are over 71; half the Janies are over 66. 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.

Both names abroad

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

Country Janice Janie
France 1,080850
Ireland 1,1056
Scotland 45879
England and Wales 326135

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: Janice and Janie.