Merritt
Merritt is a boy's name that peaked in 1924, when it was the 579th most popular in the United States. It is given to both boys and girls. In 2025 it ranked 1,499th. About 6,200 Merritts are alive in the United States today, and half of them are over 13.
Popularity, 1880–2025
girls named Merritt boys named Merritt
Girls and boys called Merritt
years more girls than boys years more boys than girls
Merritt crossed from boys to girls in 1994, and has stayed there for 8 of the years counted since. At its furthest it was 63% girls, and in 2025 it was 77%.
The girls’ share of each year’s babies of the name, in the 114 years in which at least 25 babies got it. The line touches the middle more often than there are crossings marked: a year or two on the other side is not a name changing hands, and only a move that holds for 5 counted years and reaches 60/40 is recorded as one. All 581 names that changed sex.
By the numbers
- Total US births
- 9,382
- Estimated living today
- 6,200
- Median age today
- 13
- Peak year
- 1924
- Best rank
- 579th
- Rank in 2025
- 1,499th
- First recorded
- 1880
- Girls / boys
- 3,231 / 6,151
How old the living Merritts are
born that year still alive today
Of the 9,382 babies given the name since 1880, about 6,200 are alive — 66 in every hundred. Roughly 3,400 of them are children and 710 are 65 or over. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 2012 and half after.
An estimate, not a count. SSA births aged forward through SSA cohort life tables, which know nothing about who left the country or arrived in it — so for a name that mostly came to America rather than being born in it, this is a floor rather than a figure. Where you fall among living Americans.
Notable Merritts
- Merritt Wever (born 1980)American actress
- William Merritt Chase (1849–1916)American painter
- Merritt Butrick (1959–1989)American actor
- Merritt Lyndon Fernald (1873–1950)American botanist
- Merritt Patterson (born 1990)Canadian actress
People named Merritt with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).
Where Merritt is most common
Relative to how many babies each state records, Merritt is most concentrated in North Carolina (3.3×), Nebraska (2.4×), Georgia (2.3×), Alabama (2.0×).
Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.
Names of 1924
The most popular boys’ names the year Merritt peaked:
Related names
Merritt against another name
Two names on one chart, with the year one overtook the other.
Try it on yourself
Source: US Social Security Administration, national and state baby-name files, 1880–2025. Counts include only births registered with the SSA, and names with fewer than five births in a year are not published. The living estimate applies SSA cohort life tables to those births; it counts people born in the United States, so it misses anyone who arrived later and anyone who has left.