Baby names of 1990

Jessica and Michael topped the lists in 1990, out of 3,952,585 births recorded across 22,686 different names. That is 2.8% more than the 1989 files hold. About 3.8 million of them are alive today.

← 1989 All years 1991 →

Girls

#	Name	Births
1	Jessica	46,486
2	Ashley	45,561
3	Brittany	36,536
4	Amanda	34,413
5	Samantha	25,868
6	Sarah	25,824
7	Stephanie	24,864
8	Jennifer	22,236
9	Elizabeth	20,750
10	Lauren	20,506
11	Megan	20,259
12	Emily	19,370
13	Nicole	17,954
14	Kayla	17,538
15	Amber	15,866
16	Rachel	15,710
17	Courtney	15,380
18	Danielle	14,339
19	Heather	14,220
20	Melissa	14,000
21	Rebecca	13,677
22	Michelle	13,425
23	Tiffany	13,160
24	Chelsea	12,785
25	Christina	11,927

All 200 girls’ names of 1990 (15,234 recorded)

Boys

#	Name	Births
1	Michael	65,321
2	Christopher	52,362
3	Matthew	44,826
4	Joshua	43,237
5	Daniel	33,830
6	David	33,748
7	Andrew	33,673
8	James	32,359
9	Justin	30,649
10	Joseph	30,137
11	Ryan	29,263
12	John	29,089
13	Robert	28,886
14	Nicholas	27,913
15	Anthony	25,088
16	William	24,906
17	Jonathan	24,077
18	Kyle	22,710
19	Brandon	22,163
20	Jacob	22,022
21	Tyler	20,646
22	Zachary	20,430
23	Kevin	20,413
24	Eric	19,430
25	Steven	18,764

All 200 boys’ names of 1990 (9,493 recorded)

Biggest climbers, girls

Names that gained the most ground on 1989:

Alannah #6,531 → #939 +5,592
Symone #1,998 → #820 +1,178
Shelbi #1,750 → #881 +869
Latifah #1,532 → #701 +831
Skyler #1,564 → #736 +828
Kanisha #1,444 → #714 +730
Kanesha #1,651 → #950 +701
Skylar #1,239 → #560 +679

Skyler is here because the girls’ file records it: the SSA publishes every name given to five or more babies of one sex, and a rank is a position within that list. It is not a claim about whose name it is.

Biggest climbers, boys

Names that gained the most ground on 1989:

Tevin #4,017 → #381 +3,636
Keenen #4,271 → #988 +3,283
Denzel #1,476 → #444 +1,032
Kevon #1,476 → #878 +598
Mykel #1,425 → #869 +556
Laquan #1,258 → #824 +434
Gage #755 → #359 +396
Talon #1,281 → #926 +355

First recorded in 1990, girls

Names the SSA had never published before 1990:

Isamar 447
Izamar 108
Tkeyah 38
Lexus 36
Shakiyla 35
Suleima 33
Allanah 24
Ravensymone 24
Tantania 22
Ysamar 21

First recorded in 1990, boys

Names the SSA had never published before 1990:

Dajour 26
Derrike 23
Isamar 23
Saddam 15
Takeem 15
Jiovanny 14
Decker 14
Bryer 14
Demarea 14
Damato 14

Isamar is here because the boys’ file records it: the SSA publishes every name given to five or more babies of one sex, and a rank is a position within that list. It is not a claim about whose name it is.

Try it on yourself

Source: US Social Security Administration national baby-name files. Names given to fewer than five babies in a year are not published, so the totals here run below the true number of births. How far below is not the same in every year: the files hold 201,484 births for 1880 and 3,315,343 for 2025, so a change from one year to the next in the early decades is partly a change in what the record covers.