Beryl
Feminine · “a pale green gemstone”
Beryl is given to both — 10,130 girls and 2,338 boys since 1880. See Beryl as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Beryl is a gemstone name, and it is the gemstone that gave English one of its brightest adjectives. Early spectacle lenses were ground from beryl, the word for the stone traveled into Italian as brillare, to sparkle, and that is where brilliant comes from. German still calls a pair of glasses Brille for the same reason.
How old is the name Beryl?
Beryl was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Beryl alive today was born around 1928, making them about 97 years old. About 3,000 people named Beryl are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Beryl most popular?
Beryl peaked in 1920, reaching #374 nationally. Today it ranks #10917, 10,543 places below that high. See the whole 1920 chart.
Where it comes from
From beryllos to Beryl
The story of Beryl
Beryl is not one stone but a family. Emerald is beryl colored green by chromium. Aquamarine is beryl colored blue-green by iron. Morganite is the pink one, colored by manganese, and heliodor is the yellow. All of them are the same compound, beryllium aluminum silicate, separated only by traces of other metals that got into the crystal while it grew. The stone sold as plain beryl is the one that came out of the ground with nothing coloring it, which makes the name a curious choice: it points not at the famous cousins but at the clear original they are all variations of. That is a better piece of naming than it first appears, and it is the part of the story most people who meet the name have never been told.
Meaning
a pale green gemstone
Greek beryllos, taken from an Indian source and probably from a place name in the south of the subcontinent. The word reached English through Latin and Old French as the name of the stone, and only later as a name for a child.
How the name formed
- beryllos
- beryl
- Beryl
Pronouncing Beryl
BERR-il
Two syllables with the stress at the front. It rhymes with peril and sits very close to feral, which is worth hearing aloud before deciding.
Nicknames for Beryl
Moderate
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 girls named
- 1919234 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #374reached in 1920
- Change vs 2022
- −11.1%8 in 2025, from 9
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.
Beryls among us
people named Beryl are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 200,908 born in 2025 was named Beryl
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 Hortense test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Beryl's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Hortense climbed just as high around 1903, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Hortense's path sketches the road Beryl is walking now.
Beryl sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Beryl beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Beryl in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It is a real word with a clear, concrete sense rather than a borrowed abstraction.
- The spelling is short, unambiguous and never needs repeating.
- It belongs to the gemstone tradition without being one of the obvious three.
- The generation that made it common is now very old, and the name carries that plainly.
- It rhymes with peril, which some ears catch immediately and cannot unhear.
- The record holds a few boys as well, and a boy called Beryl today would be explaining it constantly, because the name has read as a girl's for a hundred years.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Beryl to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Beryl
Feminine · #10917 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Beryls are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 3,000 people named Beryl are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Beryl in 2025?
- Beryl ranks #10917 among US girl names in 2025, with 8 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Beryl?
- About 1 in every 200,908 US girls born in 2025 was named Beryl — 8 in all.
- Will my child share the name Beryl with classmates?
- Beryl will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Beryl
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Edythe#10917 · Tessie#10917 · Drusilla#10917 · Eugenie#10917 · Ivah#10917 · Karri#10917 · Claribel#10917 · Myrtle#10917
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Beryl? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Beryl and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Weighing a whole shortlist? Add the rest in the builder, or settle it with a bracket.
Cast your vote
Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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