Bradford
Masculine · “broad ford”
Bradford is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 32,075 boys against 39 girls since 1880.
Bradford is a broad ford — a place where a river could be crossed on a wide shallow bed. It is one of the plainest descriptions in the English place-name stock, and it named a city.
How old is the name Bradford?
Bradford was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Bradford alive today was born around 1967, making them about 58 years old. About 25,000 people named Bradford are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Bradford most popular?
Bradford peaked in 1953, reaching #240 nationally. Today it ranks #3513, 3,273 places below that high. See the whole 1953 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From brad + ford to Bradford
The story of Bradford
There are Bradfords across England, the largest in West Yorkshire, which grew into a major wool city in the nineteenth century. The surname crossed into given-name use in America, helped by the Plymouth Colony governor William Bradford, whose account of the settlement is a founding document of American history. The given name peaked in American records around 1978, well after its Victorian cousins.
Meaning
broad ford
From the Old English brad, 'broad', and ford, 'river crossing'. Both are ordinary words that survive unchanged in modern English, which makes this one of the very few place names an English speaker can read without help.
How the name formed
- brad + ford
- Bradford
Related forms: Bradforde · Bradley
Pronouncing Bradford
BRAD-furd
Two syllables, stress on the first. Both elements are ordinary English words and neither is said unexpectedly.
Nicknames for Bradford
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 boys named
- 1953779 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #240reached in 1953
- Change vs 2022
- −23.8%32 in 2025, from 42
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.
Bradford in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Bradforde in English — spelling variant
- Bradley in English — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Georgia.
Bradfords among us
people named Bradford are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 53,377 born in 2025 was named Bradford
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 Pat test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Bradford's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Pat climbed just as high around 1937, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Pat's path sketches the road Bradford is walking now.
Bradford 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
Where Bradford is headed
Bradford should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
Medium 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.
Bradford beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Bradford in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is completely transparent to any English speaker.
- Brad and Ford are both available and are very different in feel.
- It carries both an English city and a documented American founder.
- It reads as a surname to many people, which is what it was for eight hundred years.
- It is a long, formal-sounding name in an era that has favored shorter ones.
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What they receive
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Bradford
Masculine · #3513 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Bradfords are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 25,000 people named Bradford are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Bradford in 2025?
- Bradford ranks #3513 among US boy names in 2025, with 32 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Bradford?
- About 1 in every 53,377 US boys born in 2025 was named Bradford — 32 in all.
- Will my child share the name Bradford with classmates?
- Bradford will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Bradford
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Denton#3513 · Harden#3513 · Geronimo#3513 · Breon#3513 · Hashem#3513 · Jamere#3513 · Hazael#3513 · Leslie#3513
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Bradford? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Bradford 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. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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