Orlan vs Orlo

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Orlan Orlo

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 86 years in which either name was published, Orlan for 48 years and Orlo for 38 years. The lead changed hands 15 times.

• 1881–1925 Orlo ahead, apart from 2 short spells
• 1926–1928 Orlan ahead
• 1929–1931 Orlo ahead
• 1934–2012 Orlan ahead, apart from 2 short spells
• 2016–2019 Orlo ahead
• 2020–2025 Orlan ahead

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

Side by side

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 Orlos alive today are over 78; half the Orlans are over 68. That is 10 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Both names abroad

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

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

• Orlan vs Orlando
• Orlan vs Orland
• Orlan vs Orlin
• Orlan vs Orla
• Orlan vs Orly
• Orlo vs Orlando
• Orlo vs Orland
• Orlo vs Orlin