Edison
Masculine · “son of Edith”
Edison is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 12,522 boys against 216 girls since 1880.
Edison began as an English surname, one of the family names built from a parent's name plus "son" — and it crossed over to the front of the name for a reason no one has to guess at: the man who made the phonograph and the practical incandescent lamp. In the mouth it is three even beats, ED-ih-son, with Ed and Eddie waiting inside it. It has never left the American record since it first arrived there.
How old is the name Edison?
Edison first appears in US birth records in 1891 — 134 years ago. The typical Edison alive today was born around 2009, making them about 16 years old. About 9,900 people named Edison are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Edison most popular?
Edison peaked in 1917, reaching #538 nationally. Today it ranks #867, 329 places below that high. See the whole 1917 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Eadgyth to Edison
The story of Edison
The name grew up in England as a surname, formed the way Jackson and Harrison were, from a parent's name plus the word for son. Its life as a first name is an American story: Thomas Edison's laboratory work made the surname a household word across the country in the late nineteenth century, and families began putting it on sons. It traveled again from there into Spanish- and Portuguese-speaking countries, where Edison, Édison and the trimmed Edson all took firm root — Brazil in particular has used Edson for generations. Its strongest American footholds today are the big, multilingual states, which fits a name with two separate routes in.
Meaningscholars disagree
"son of Edith" — or "son of Edde", a medieval pet form of Edward and Adam
Both readings are taken seriously by surname scholars. The first traces to Eda, a medieval short form of Edith (Old English Eadgyth, from ead "wealth, fortune" and gyth "battle"). The second traces to Edde, which stood in for both Edward and Adam. Either way the ead- element of the old English names sits somewhere behind it.
How the name formed
- Eadgyth
- Edith
- Eda
- Edison
Related forms: Edson · Édison · Edinson · Edisson
Pronouncing Edison
ED-ih-son
Three syllables, stress on the first. In Spanish the accented Édison keeps that first-syllable stress; Portuguese Edson comes out closer to ED-son, and the Uruguayan form Edinson is stressed ed-in-SON.
Nicknames for Edison
High
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
- 1891
- Most boys named
- 2017495 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #538reached in 1917
- Change vs 2022
- −20.5%276 in 2025, from 347
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.
Edison in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Edson in Portuguese — related form
- Édison in Spanish — spelling variant
- Edinson in Spanish (Latin America) — related form
- Edisson in Spanish (Latin America) — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Edisons among us
people named Edison are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 6,189 born in 2025 was named Edison
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 Marcellus test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Edison's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Marcellus climbed just as high around 1902, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Marcellus's path sketches the road Edison is walking now.
Edison 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 Edison is headed
Edison is easing off slowly — about 19% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
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.
Edison beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Edison in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Almost everyone can spell it on first hearing, because the surname is already familiar in English.
- Comes with ready-made short forms — Ed, Eddie, Eddy — that need no explaining.
- Works across English, Spanish and Portuguese, with Edson and Édison well established in Latin America.
- Has been in continuous use on American boys since the nineteenth century, never fashionable enough to date sharply.
- The association with the inventor is close to total. Expect a lifetime of "like the lightbulb?" — usually friendly, but it will come up, and any classroom unit on electricity will feature his name.
- The short forms Ed and Eddie point most people toward Edward first, so he may spend a beat correcting the assumption.
- Spanish and Portuguese bring in Edson, Édison and Edinson, which are close enough to invite mix-ups in a household or community that uses more than one language.
- He is unlikely to meet another Edison at school. That means the name is his alone, and also that he will be the one teaching it to people.
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Edison
Masculine · #867 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Edisons are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 9,900 people named Edison are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Edison in 2025?
- Edison ranks #867 among US boy names in 2025, with 276 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Edison?
- About 1 in every 6,189 US boys born in 2025 was named Edison — 276 in all.
- Will my child share the name Edison with classmates?
- Edison will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Edison
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Alessio#867 · Brycen#867 · Carlo#867 · Conner#864 · Zev#864 · Jesiah#864 · Aryan#871 · Stanley#863
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Edison? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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