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Carsten

Masculine · “follower of Christ”

Carsten is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 2,367 boys against 10 girls since 1880.

1912high 2011
#4249 in the U.S.given to only a few children a year
rare24 boys in 2025

Carsten is the north German spelling of the same name as Karsten, and the two are distinguished only by which side of a regional border a family came from.

How old is the name Carsten?

Carsten first appears in US birth records in 1912 — 113 years ago. The typical Carsten alive today was born around 2009, making them about 16 years old. About 2,200 people named Carsten are estimated to be alive in the US today.

When was the name Carsten most popular?

Carsten peaked in 2011, reaching #1319 nationally. Today it ranks #4249, 2,930 places below that high. See the whole 2011 chart.

Compare this nameMore “C” names

Lists built from the same records:

I

Where it comes from

Our story of Carsten

Ours, offered as ours. German spelling has never fully settled between c and k for this sound, and the pattern runs along old regional lines: the north-west and Denmark tend to Carsten, further east and in Norway Karsten is commoner. Neither is more correct. Both are what Low German did to Christian over several centuries, losing the ch entirely — a reduction so thorough that the two names look unrelated.

Meaning

follower of Christ

From Greek christos, anointed, through Latin Christianus; Low German and Danish reduced Christian to Kersten and then Carsten and Karsten. The C and K spellings are regional rather than meaningful.

Pronouncing Carsten

KAR-sten

Two syllables, first stressed. German and Danish give the same shape.

Nicknames for Carsten

Moderate

CarsThe front clip
StenTakes the ending
KaiA related north German short form
II

What the data says

The long climb, and where it stands now

BOYS NAMED · 1912–20251296501292419122025

US babies named Carsten per year from 1912 to 2025
AVERAGE RANK BY DECADE#1#10#100#1000#13191910s2020s

The same years in position rather than babies

First recorded
1912
Most boys named
2011129 — the highest on record
Peak rank
#1319reached in 2011
Change vs 2023
−27.3%24 in 2025, from 33
Carsten sits in the rare tail. Its best year on record was 2011, with 129 boys. Today it is given to few enough children that it does not enter the ranked charts at all.

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.

Carsten in other languages

The same name elsewhere

  • Karsten in German — spelling variant
  • Carsten in Danish — same name
  • Christian in English — related form

Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, Virginia, Alabama.

Carstens among us

2,200

people named Carsten are estimated to be alive in the US today

About 1 boy in 71,170 born in 2025 was named Carsten

Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method

Spellings of Carsten

#4249
Carsten on the 2025 chart
#879
counting every spelling

The SSA counts spellings, not names. Carsten went to 24 boys in 2025, but Karsten is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 49, which makes it the 879th most-given boys’ name of the year — 3,370 places above the chart.

About 1 boy in 34,859 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 71,170 for Carsten itself.

Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method

III

Is it right for you

The Rasheem test

Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Carsten's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Rasheem climbed just as high around 1979, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Rasheem's path sketches the road Carsten is walking now.

40%chance Carsten will feel dated by 2040
Carsten, aligned on its peakRasheem· peak 1979not yet written
#1#10#100#1000peak-40 yrs+50 yrsRasheem · #7731Carsten today
Carsten today is about where Rasheem stood in 1993 — 14 years past a #1319-sized peak. By 2008, Rasheem had settled around #5129.
Ages quietlysteadyDates fast

Carsten 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

Carsten beside its neighbors

The names ranked closest to Carsten in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.

Carstenthis name24#4249Guadalupe24#4249Denny24#4249Hughes24#4249Erling24#4249

US boys given each name in 2025.

The trade-off

Practical strengths
  • A settled meaning inherited from one of the central words of European history.
  • Sten and Kai are both complete Scandinavian names in their own right.
  • Read correctly on sight by most English speakers.
What to consider
  • Carsten and Karsten are both standard and mark different regions.
  • The connection to Christian is invisible and needs explaining.
  • The Cars clip is an ordinary English word.

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Carsten

Masculine · #4249 in the U.S.

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Frequently asked

How many Carstens are there in the world?
No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 2,200 people named Carsten are estimated to be alive in the US today.
How do you spell Carsten?
Carsten is one of 2 recorded spellings. Karsten is the more common one — 25 births in 2025 against 24 for Carsten.
How popular is the name Carsten in 2025?
Carsten ranks #4249 among US boy names in 2025, with 24 babies given the name.
How rare is the name Carsten?
About 1 in every 71,170 US boys born in 2025 was named Carsten — 24 in all.
Will my child share the name Carsten with classmates?
Carsten will almost certainly be the only one in school.

Ranked beside Carsten

Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.

Guadalupe#4249 · Denny#4249 · Hughes#4249 · Erling#4249 · Rodrick#4249 · Elric#4249 · Ron#4249 · Wright#4249

Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Carsten? See the current top 100.

Choosing between Carsten and another name?

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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology

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