The sweet spot: familiar but not everywhere

Before the names

Names sitting between #101 and #300 hit exactly that balance. Here they are, in order.

The band is chosen, not arbitrary. Above #100 a name is common enough that a class of thirty is likely to hold two; below #300 recognition starts to thin and the spelling question comes back. Between those two lines a name is known by everyone and shared by almost nobody, and that is a narrower window than it sounds.

Some arithmetic for what a rank means. A name at #150 goes to a few thousand babies a year across a country of roughly 3.6 million births — on the order of one in a thousand children of that sex. A name in the top 10 runs closer to one in a hundred. That factor of ten is the entire difference this list is built on.

The band moves, though. Ranks are recalculated every year, and a name at #110 that is climbing will be inside the top 100 within a few years, taking its classroom arithmetic with it. If the balance is what you are here for, the direction of travel matters as much as today's position.