Darrel
Masculine · “of Airelle”
Darrel is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 29,769 boys against 123 girls since 1880.
Darrel is a Norman village with an apostrophe worn off. The family came from Airelle in Calvados, and 'd'Airelle' — of Airelle — became Darrell and then a first name.
How old is the name Darrel?
Darrel first appears in US birth records in 1900 — 125 years ago. The typical Darrel alive today was born around 1955, making them about 70 years old. About 18,500 people named Darrel are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Darrel most popular?
Darrel peaked in 1939, reaching #242 nationally. Today it ranks #5399, 5,157 places below that high. See the whole 1939 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From d'Airelle to Darrel
The story of Darrel
Norman families took their surnames from their landholdings, and the d'Airelle family carried theirs to England after the Conquest, where the apostrophe disappeared and the name became Darrell and Dayrell. The surname crossed into given-name use in twentieth-century America, rising sharply through the 1940s and 1950s. The single-l spelling Darrel peaked in the mid-1950s.
Meaning
of Airelle
From the Norman French d'Airelle, marking origin in a place of that name in Calvados. The place name itself is generally connected to a word for a small open space or for the bilberry plant; that part is less secure than the surname's derivation, which is well documented.
How the name formed
- d'Airelle
- Darrell
- Darrel
Related forms: Darrell · Daryl · Darryl
Pronouncing Darrel
DA-rul
Two syllables, stress on the first. All the spellings are said identically.
Nicknames for Darrel
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
- 1900
- Most boys named
- 1960659 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #242reached in 1939
- Change vs 2022
- −15.0%17 in 2025, from 20
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.
Darrel in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Darrell in English — spelling variant
- Daryl in English — spelling variant
- Darryl in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Florida.
Darrels among us
people named Darrel are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 100,475 born in 2025 was named Darrel
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Darrel
- #5399
- Darrel on the 2025 chart
- #683
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Darrel went to 17 boys in 2025, but Darrell, Darell and Darel are the same name said out loud. Together the 4 spellings went to 253, which makes it the 683rd most-given boys’ name of the year — 4,716 places above the chart.
About 1 boy in 6,751 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 100,475 for Darrel 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 Buster test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Darrel's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Buster climbed just as high around 1909, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Buster's path sketches the road Darrel is walking now.
Darrel 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
Darrel beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Darrel in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A documented Norman place and family stand behind it.
- Two soft syllables that pair well with almost any surname.
- No pronunciation ambiguity at all in English.
- At least four spellings were in use at once, so it will be written wrongly often.
- It is closely dated to the middle of the twentieth century.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Darrel to the vote.
Add it to a family vote or a couple’s swipe deck — the other person gets one card, a simple answer and room to say why. No app, no account for them.
Only the people you invite can see your list.
Already decided on Darrel? Hide it among decoys and let them guess.
What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Darrel
Masculine · #5399 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Darrels are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 18,500 people named Darrel are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Darrel?
- Darrel is one of 4 recorded spellings. Darrell is the more common one — 97 births in 2025 against 17 for Darrel.
- How popular is the name Darrel in 2025?
- Darrel ranks #5399 among US boy names in 2025, with 17 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Darrel?
- About 1 in every 100,475 US boys born in 2025 was named Darrel — 17 in all.
- Will my child share the name Darrel with classmates?
- Darrel will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Darrel
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Frazier#5399 · Franz#5399 · Demetrio#5399 · Rolan#5399 · Rayvon#5399 · Riddick#5399 · Laramie#5399 · Soloman#5399
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Darrel? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Darrel and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
Compare side by sideIn a hurry? Just pick a winner — one tap, no sign-up, and you see how everyone else voted.
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
No advertising trackers and no data sellinghow we handle your dataindependent and founder-run, about Name Battle