Humanverse

Neri vs Nero

American parents have registered 878 Neris since 1880, against 526 Neros. But in 2025 it was Nero that was commoner, 21 babies to 13.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

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

Neri Nero

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 66 years in which either name was published, Neri for 36 years and Nero for 30 years. The lead changed hands 12 times.

9 shorter spells of a year or two are folded into the spans above rather than listed separately.

Side by side

  Neri Nero
Total US births 878526
Most in one year 9339
Babies in 2025 1321
Estimated living today 860430
Median age today 178
Peak year 20072023
Best rank 1,781st boys3,117th boys
Rank in 2025 12,008th4,707th
First recorded 19521914
Girls / boys 228 / 6500 / 526

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 Neris alive today are over 17; half the Neros are over 8. That is 9 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 Neri Nero
England and Wales 1585

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: Neri and Nero.