Head to head · Girls' names
Lacey vs Penny
#738 vs #740 in 2025 · both holding its place on the charts
Lacey is a whisker ahead (#738 vs #740 in 2025) and both are holding its place on the charts. The records will not split these two — sound, story and your own last name will.
Cast your vote
Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
The tale of the tape
On the charts, Penny leads 3 measures of 6; Lacey leads 2.
Ranks, counts and years are measured in the official US birth record; the classroom and living figures are estimates computed from it. The dot marks the side each measure favours on the charts — more common, not better.
What the records say
146 years of US births, drawn on one scale
Two curves, one scale
Who owned which decade
- 1880s: Lacey #1276, Penny #1022 — Penny higher
- 1890s: Lacey —, Penny #1404 — Penny higher
- 1900s: Lacey #1592, Penny #1729 — Lacey higher
- 1910s: Lacey #3343, Penny #1953 — Penny higher
- 1920s: Lacey #4110, Penny #1178 — Penny higher
- 1930s: Lacey #4067, Penny #909 — Penny higher
- 1940s: Lacey #3704, Penny #190 — Penny higher
- 1950s: Lacey #3211, Penny #149 — Penny higher
- 1960s: Lacey #2055, Penny #108 — Penny higher
- 1970s: Lacey #893, Penny #233 — Penny higher
- 1980s: Lacey #147, Penny #715 — Lacey higher
- 1990s: Lacey #234, Penny #1946 — Lacey higher
- 2000s: Lacey #417, Penny #2798 — Lacey higher
- 2010s: Lacey #519, Penny #947 — Lacey higher
- 2020s: Lacey #773, Penny #720 — Penny higher
Penny stood higher in 10 of 15 decades; Penny took the 2020s.
Rank by decade
| Decade | Lacey | Penny |
|---|---|---|
| 1880s | #1276 | #1022 |
| 1890s | — | #1404 |
| 1900s | #1592 | #1729 |
| 1910s | #3343 | #1953 |
| 1920s | #4110 | #1178 |
| 1930s | #4067 | #909 |
| 1940s | #3704 | #190 |
| 1950s | #3211 | #149 |
| 1960s | #2055 | #108 |
| 1970s | #893 | #233 |
| 1980s | #147 | #715 |
| 1990s | #234 | #1946 |
| 2000s | #417 | #2798 |
| 2010s | #519 | #947 |
| 2020s | #773 | #720 |
Average national rank across each decade. A dash means the name sat outside the recorded top of that decade.
The names themselves
Meaning, roots, sound and the people who carried each
Where each name comes from
Lacey
from Lassy
The surname comes from a Norman village, and the village name is probably built on a Gallo-Roman personal name with a common Latin place-name suffix. The reading is a location rather than a description. The English word for the fabric is unrelated, coming through French from a Latin word about nooses and snares, and no connection between them exists.
A Norman village name in Calvados → Carried to England by a baronial family → Estates in the Welsh marches and the Irish midlands → Lacey as an American first name from the nineteenth century
How it traveled
The family came over with the conquest, took land in the Welsh marches, and within two generations were among the most powerful barons in England. A later branch was granted most of what is now the Irish midlands, built castles across it, quarreled with the crown, was dispossessed, and got much of it back.
Penny
Short form of Penelope; also the English coin
Penelope's Greek root is argued two ways: from pēnē, the weft or thread on a loom, which suits Homer's weaving heroine, and from pēnelops, a kind of duck named in Greek myth. Scholars have never resolved it. Separately, Penny is identical to the English word for the coin, from Old English penig — an overlap of sound rather than a shared root."
Pēnelopeia → Penelope → Penny
How it traveled
The name behind it is Penelope, from the Greek Pēnelopeia, carried into English through the Latin and Greek texts read in schools from the Renaissance onward. Penelope stayed a somewhat literary choice in English for centuries, and Penny grew up beside it as the everyday form — the version used at home, at school, across the kitchen.
Where a reading is contested the note says so — this page does not turn a guess into a fact. The chain is each name's recorded forms, oldest first; the story is its opening, told in full on the name's own page.
Out loud, and in short
Lacey
LAY-see
Two syllables, stress on the first, said exactly like the adjective made from the fabric. French says the village name quite differently, with the stress at the back and a shorter first vowel.
- Lace — The name minus its ending, which lands squarely on the fabric it has nothing to do with.
- Lay — The front, which is an ordinary English verb and works poorly on its own.
- Cee — Built from the middle, minimal and entirely unshared.
Penny
PEN-ee
Stress on the first syllable. It survives accents and phone calls intact, and English speakers spell it correctly on the first hearing.
- Pen — The one further shortening in real use; informal, mostly within families.
- Penelope — Not a nickname but the long form behind it — some parents register Penelope and use Penny daily, others register Penny alone.
- Pennie — An alternate spelling that has been recorded as a given name in its own right.
Is it right for you
The differences that decide it, laid out by what you want
Choose by what you want
Choose Lacey if you want…
- a name holding steadyLacey is holding its place on the charts
Choose Penny if you want…
On the measures here, the records do not separate Penny from Lacey.
Each line is a measured difference between the two names — a rank, a count, a recorded form — never a judgement of either. Save the one that answers your question; it lands on your shortlist.
The trade-offs, name by name
Lacey
Strengths
- Nobody will mispronounce it or need it spelled twice.
- It works on the register for either child, which the record confirms.
- It has a genuine Norman history that is considerably more robust than it sounds.
To consider
- It will be heard as the fabric, and the association is not going anywhere.
- Lacy and Lacie are both in use and yours will be written as one of them.
- It is closely tied to a stretch of the nineteen eighties in American ears.
Penny
Strengths
- Everyone can already spell it — it is the same string of letters as the coin, learned in childhood.
- Works either way: as a full legal name or as the everyday form of Penelope, which keeps a formal option open.
- On American records continuously since the nineteenth century, so it reads as familiar rather than newly minted anywhere in the country.
To consider
- It is a common noun as well as a name, so the coin phrases come with it: penny for your thoughts, a pretty penny, penny-pinching. Most bearers hear them early and stop noticing.
- It is still strongly represented among older generations, which means many people will have known a grown-up Penny before they meet a small one.
- People often assume it is short for something and ask for the full name. If you register Penny alone, expect to say so more than once.
Documented properties of each name — how it spells, travels and shortens — not opinions about the child.
With your last name
Say both in full. The notes are facts about letters and sound — a rhyme, a shared initial, the monogram — not a verdict on either name.
Type a last name to hear Lacey and Penny in full.
Weighing the whole shortlist? Run the full comparison — up to eight names with your last name, initials, classroom projections and a printable report.
Decide together
Nobody names a baby alone
Still torn between Lacey and Penny?
Put both to the vote.
One link to your partner, your parents, your sister. Each of them gets the two names, a one-tap answer and room to say why — and every reply lands in one place.
Free to start · no account needed · everyone you invite votes in one tap
More than two in the running? Settle it with a bracket or run the full comparison with your last name.
More head-to-heads
Same measures, different pair. Sixty more are dealt daily in the arena.
Lists these names appear on
- Midcentury modern: tomorrow's comeback bets
- Disney names on real birth certificates
- Broadway names from the stage door
- Names that belong entirely to the 1960s
- all guides
Where Lacey and Penny each sit in the library — alternatives in the same style, ranked by the same records.
Lacey or Penny — the short answers
- Which is more popular, Lacey or Penny?
- Lacey, in 2025: Lacey ranked #738 with 370 babies; Penny ranked #740 with 368 babies.
- Which name is rising faster, Lacey or Penny?
- Neither is rising. Over the last five years Lacey moved down 26 places; Penny moved down 15 places.
- Which is the older name, Lacey or Penny?
- Lacey entered the US charts in 1888; Penny entered the US charts in 1882. On the American record, Penny is the older name.
- How many people are named Lacey and Penny?
- About 52,500 people named Lacey are estimated to be alive in the US today. About 85,500 people named Penny are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- Will there be other Laceys or Pennys in the classroom?
- Lacey will almost certainly be the only one in school. Penny will almost certainly be the only one in school.
US figures from the Social Security Administration, 1880–2025. Votes are battle voters on this site, not the birth record. Data & methodology
Keep playing
Sixty more head-to-heads are dealt in the arena every day — or line up Lacey, Penny and the rest of your shortlist with your last name in one printable report.
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