Alexander
Masculine · Ancient Greek roots · “defender of men”
Alexander is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 736,123 boys against 4,545 girls since 1880. See Alexander as a girl name
Alexander has been spoken continuously for well over two thousand years — Greek before Rome, then Latin, then carried by Christian saints, Scottish kings and Russian tsars into nearly every European language. It is four syllables that most English speakers can spell on the first hearing, with a soft opening and that ringing -ZAN- in the middle. Few names have traveled so far and come back so intact.
How old is the name Alexander?
Alexander was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Alexander alive today was born around 1998, making them about 27 years old. About 674,000 people named Alexander are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Alexander most popular?
Alexander peaked in 2009, reaching #4 nationally. Today it ranks #30, 26 places below that high. See the whole 2009 chart.
Where it comes from
From Alexandros (Ancient Greek) to Alexander
The story of Alexander
The name is Greek, formed from ordinary Greek words, and appears in the Iliad as a second name for the Trojan prince Paris. Alexander III of Macedon carried it east in the fourth century BC, and in his wake it was given across the Hellenistic world, from Egypt to the edge of India. Early Christian bishops and martyrs bore it, which kept it in use through the Middle Ages, and three medieval kings of Scots made it a Scottish fixture — one reason it still charts strongly in Scotland today. It reached Arabic and Persian as Iskandar and Slavic as Aleksandr, giving it a footprint few names can match.
Meaning
defender of men
From Greek alexein, to ward off or defend, joined to aner (stem andr-), man. The two halves are visible in the name to this day.
Cultural footprint
Alexander the Great (b. -356) — Conquered the known world by age 30
Alexander Hamilton (b. 1757) — The ten-dollar Founding Father of Broadway fame
Alexander Graham Bell (b. 1847) — Invented the telephone
Alexander Fleming (b. 1881) — Discovered penicillin
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- AlexandrosAncient Greek
- AlexanderLatin
- AlisaunderMedieval English
- AlexanderModern English
Related forms: Alejandro · Alessandro · Alexandre · Aleksandr · Alasdair · Iskandar
Pronouncing Alexander
al-ig-ZAN-der
Stress on the third syllable. Some speakers say al-ex-AN-der with a clearer x; both are standard in American English.
Nicknames for Alexander
High
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1880
- Most boys named
- 199220,069 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #4reached in 2009
- Change vs 2022
- −17.4%7,230 in 2025, from 8,757
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Alexander in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Alejandro in Spanish — same name
- Alessandro in Italian — same name
- Alexandre in French — same name
- Aleksandr in Russian — transliteration
- Alasdair in Scottish Gaelic — same name
- Iskandar in Arabic — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida. International figures from National Records of Scotland, Office for National Statistics, Statistics Canada. Sources
Alexanders among us
people named Alexander are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 236 born in 2025 was named Alexander
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Joseph test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Alexander's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Joseph climbed just as high around 1912, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Joseph's path sketches the road Alexander is walking now.
Alexander has held the top-100 across 9 different decades — it has never depended on fashion, and names like that read the same at any age.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Alexander is headed
Alexander should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Alexander beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Alexander in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Unusually rich in short forms — Alex, Xander, Zander, Sasha, Sandy — so the same name can be formal on a diploma and casual on a soccer roster.
- Spelled and recognized in dozens of languages, with close equivalents in Spanish, Italian, French, Russian and Arabic.
- Currently charts in Scotland, England & Wales and Canada as well as the US, so it travels without explanation.
- A documented record stretching from ancient Greek texts to this year's kindergartens, with no long gap in between.
- Strongly represented across the US and particularly well used in California, Texas and Florida.
- It is a genuinely common name, and has been for a long time. In many schools there will be another Alexander, or at least another Alex, in the building.
- Alex is so established that other people may reach for it before you do. If you want the full four syllables, expect to ask for them regularly.
- Nine letters is a lot for a small hand learning to sign a worksheet, though most children arrive at a short form long before that becomes a problem.
- Variant spellings exist — Aleksander, Alexandr, Alejandro — so the name is occasionally repeated back for confirmation, even though the standard English spelling is well known.
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What they receive
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Alexander
Masculine · Ancient Greek roots · #30 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Alexanders are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 674,000 people named Alexander are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Alexander in 2025?
- Alexander ranks #30 among US boy names in 2025, with 7,230 babies given the name.
- How common is the name Alexander?
- About 1 in every 236 US boys born in 2025 was named Alexander — 7,230 in all.
- Will my child share the name Alexander with classmates?
- Roughly 1 in 9 classrooms will have a child named Alexander.
Ranked beside Alexander
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Joseph#29 · Owen#31 · Asher#28 · Matthew#32 · Cooper#27 · Luke#33 · Santiago#26 · Thomas#34
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Alexander? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Alexander and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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