Cedric
Masculine
Cedric is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 42,104 boys against 278 girls since 1880.
Cedric arrived in the world through print: Sir Walter Scott gave the name to Cedric of Rotherwood, the stubborn Saxon lord of Ivanhoe, in 1819. Sixty-odd years later Frances Hodgson Burnett handed it to the small hero of Little Lord Fauntleroy, and English-speaking parents began using it for real children. Two syllables, one falling neatly after the other, and no argument about how to say it.
How old is the name Cedric?
Cedric first appears in US birth records in 1890 — 135 years ago. The typical Cedric alive today was born around 1981, making them about 44 years old. About 37,000 people named Cedric are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Cedric most popular?
Cedric peaked in 1974, reaching #230 nationally. Today it ranks #1051, 821 places below that high. See the whole 1974 chart.
Cedric appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From Cerdic to Cedric
The story of Cedric
Cedric is one of the small number of names that can be traced to a single book. Scott coined it for Ivanhoe in 1819, almost certainly reworking Cerdic, the name attached in early English sources to the first king of Wessex; the altered spelling is what stuck. In the 1880s Frances Hodgson Burnett made Cedric the given name of her golden-haired Little Lord Fauntleroy, and from there it moved off the page and onto birth records in Britain and America. France took it up separately and thoroughly in the twentieth century as Cédric, which is why the name now sounds equally at home in two languages.
Meaningnot established
Not established
There is no established meaning, because the name began as a written invention rather than a word. Scott appears to have adapted Cerdic, the name recorded for the semi-legendary founder of the West Saxon kingdom in the fifth or sixth century — a name whose own origin is unresolved and likely Brittonic rather than Old English. So what is documented is a chain of literature, not a translation.
How the name formed
- Cerdic
- Cedric
- Cédric
Related forms: Cédric · Cedric · Cedric · Cerdic
Pronouncing Cedric
SED-rik
The C is soft, and the stress falls on the first syllable. In French, Cédric is closer to say-DREEK, so a bilingual family may hear two different versions of the same name.
Nicknames for Cedric
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
- 1890
- Most boys named
- 1981909 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #230reached in 1974
- Change vs 2022
- −11.4%209 in 2025, from 236
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.
Cedric in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Cédric in French — spelling variant
- Cedric in Dutch — same name
- Cedric in German — same name
- Cerdic in Old English (records) — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Florida.
Cedrics among us
people named Cedric are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 8,173 born in 2025 was named Cedric
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Cedric
- #1051
- Cedric on the 2025 chart
- #682
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Cedric went to 209 boys in 2025, but Cedrick, Cedrik and Sedric are the same name said out loud. Together the 4 spellings went to 255, which makes it the 682nd most-given boys’ name of the year — 369 places above the chart.
About 1 boy in 6,698 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 8,173 for Cedric 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
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Louie test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Cedric's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Louie climbed just as high around 1901, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Louie's path sketches the road Cedric is walking now.
Cedric 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 Cedric is headed
Cedric 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.
Cedric beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Cedric in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- One spelling, one English pronunciation — people who have never met a Cedric still read it correctly on sight.
- Unbroken use in American records since the nineteenth century, without ever becoming a name every classroom holds.
- Works in French as Cédric with only an accent changing, which makes it portable across two large languages.
- Has a genuine short form in Ced, so a Cedric is not stuck with the full three-beat name in every situation.
- There is no meaning to hand over when someone asks. Cedric was made for a novel, and the older name behind it is itself unexplained — a good story, but not a tidy answer.
- The literary associations are strong and go two ways: Burnett's velvet-suited Little Lord Fauntleroy, and Cedric Diggory in the Harry Potter books, who does not survive the story. Neither is a problem, but both may come up.
- Most Cedrics in the country are grown adults, so a child with the name will likely be the only young one in the room while every adult recognizes it instantly.
- Variant spellings like Cedrick and Sedrick exist, so expect the occasional need to confirm which one you meant.
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Cedric
Masculine · #1051 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Cedrics are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 37,000 people named Cedric are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Cedric?
- Cedric is the most-used spelling in US records — 209 of the 255 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Cedrick, Cedrik and Sedric.
- How popular is the name Cedric in 2025?
- Cedric ranks #1051 among US boy names in 2025, with 209 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Cedric?
- About 1 in every 8,173 US boys born in 2025 was named Cedric — 209 in all.
- Will my child share the name Cedric with classmates?
- Cedric will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Cedric
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Krishiv#1051 · Gordon#1051 · Slade#1054 · Marcellus#1054 · Dash#1056 · True#1046 · Rishi#1056 · Shlomo#1046
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Cedric? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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