Crimson
Feminine · “a deep red”
Crimson is given to both — 1,278 girls and 558 boys since 1880. See Crimson as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Crimson is a color with an insect inside it. The word came into English through Spanish from Arabic qirmizi, which named the dye made from the dried bodies of the kermes scale insect, gathered off oak trees in the Mediterranean. It is one of the oldest trade words in the language, and it now names children.
How old is the name Crimson?
Crimson first appears in US birth records in 1974 — 51 years ago. The typical Crimson alive today was born around 2012, making them about 13 years old. About 1,300 people named Crimson are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Crimson most popular?
Crimson peaked in 2016, reaching #2539 nationally. Today it ranks #4758, 2,219 places below that high. See the whole 2016 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From qirmizi to Crimson
The story of Crimson
For most of European history a true deep red was expensive, because the dye had to be gathered insect by insect, and the words for the color record where the trade came from: crimson from Arabic, scarlet from a kind of cloth, vermilion from a worm. Crimson entered English in the fourteenth century and stayed a color word for six hundred years. Color names for children are recent, and mostly American: Scarlett arrived first and made the category ordinary, and Crimson, Indigo and Sienna followed it in the last two decades.
Meaning
a deep red; the color of kermes dye
Arabic qirmizi, of the kermes, through Old Spanish cremesin and Old French into English. The kermes insect was the source of the dye before cochineal reached Europe from the Americas, and the word traveled with the trade.
How the name formed
- qirmizi
- cremesin
- crimson
Related forms: Carmesí · قرمزي
Pronouncing Crimson
KRIM-sun
Two syllables, stress in front, exactly as the color word. There is no other reading.
Nicknames for Crimson
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
- 1974
- Most girls named
- 201670 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2539reached in 2016
- Change vs 2024
- −17.6%28 in 2025, from 34
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.
Crimson in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Carmesí in Spanish — related form
- قرمزي in Arabic — transliteration
Strongest US states over the last decade: Alabama, Tennessee, Texas.
Crimsons among us
people named Crimson are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 57,402 born in 2025 was named Crimson
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Crimson
- #4758
- Crimson on the 2025 chart
- #924
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Crimson went to 28 girls in 2025, but Krimson is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 36, which makes it the 924th most-given girls’ name of the year — 3,834 places above the chart.
- Crimson28
- Krimson8
About 1 girl in 44,646 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 57,402 for Crimson 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 Jamilla test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Crimson's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Jamilla climbed just as high around 1988, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Jamilla's path sketches the road Crimson is walking now.
Crimson 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 Crimson is headed
Crimson 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.
Crimson beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Crimson in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is a color anyone can picture, and the etymology behind it is genuinely interesting.
- Everyone can spell it and say it after hearing it once.
- It sits in a small but established group of color names rather than standing entirely alone.
- It is a word before it is a name, so it appears in ordinary sentences the child will hear.
- Deep red carries associations of blood and of warning that some readers reach for first.
- There is no traditional short form, so a family that wants one will be inventing it.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Crimson
Feminine · #4758 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Crimsons are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,300 people named Crimson are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Crimson?
- Crimson is the most-used spelling in US records — 28 of the 36 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Krimson.
- How popular is the name Crimson in 2025?
- Crimson ranks #4758 among US girl names in 2025, with 28 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Crimson?
- About 1 in every 57,402 US girls born in 2025 was named Crimson — 28 in all.
- Will my child share the name Crimson with classmates?
- Crimson will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Crimson
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Marylou#4758 · Landon#4758 · Lexa#4758 · Alysia#4758 · Ixchel#4758 · Parisa#4758 · Jumana#4758 · Berenice#4758
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Crimson? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Crimson and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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