Gilbert
Masculine · “bright pledge”
Gilbert is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 130,148 boys against 673 girls since 1880. See Gilbert as a girl name
Gilbert arrived with the Normans and has been in continuous English use ever since, which very few names from that wave managed. The Englishman who carried it in the twelfth century founded the only monastic order England ever produced, and it was destroyed completely.
How old is the name Gilbert?
Gilbert was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Gilbert alive today was born around 1948, making them about 77 years old. About 64,500 people named Gilbert are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Gilbert most popular?
Gilbert peaked in 1930, reaching #90 nationally. Today it ranks #1328, 1,238 places below that high. See the whole 1930 chart.
Where it comes from
From Gislebert to Gilbert
The story of Gilbert
Every other monastic order in medieval England was imported — Benedictines, Cistercians, Franciscans, all founded abroad. One was not. Gilbert of Sempringham, a Lincolnshire parish priest, began by building a cloister against his church wall for seven local women who wanted a religious life, and what grew from it became an order of double houses: nuns and canons in the same establishment, separated by a wall, with a turning hatch for passing things through and strict rules about who could see whom. At its height it had over twenty houses and something like fifteen hundred members. It existed only in England, it was suppressed entirely at the Dissolution, and unlike the international orders it had nowhere to survive. Nothing of it continued anywhere.
Meaning
bright pledge
A Germanic compound joining a word for a hostage or pledge to one meaning bright or famous. It came into England through Normandy and stayed, becoming an ordinary English name rather than a foreign one within a couple of generations.
How the name formed
- Gislebert
- Gilbert
Related forms: Gilbert · Gilberto · Gilberto · Giselbert
Pronouncing Gilbert
GIL-burt
Two syllables with the stress at the front and a hard g. Spanish and Portuguese say the g as a throat sound, which makes the same spelling a noticeably different name.
Nicknames for Gilbert
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
- 1880
- Most boys named
- 19302,119 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #90reached in 1930
- Change vs 2022
- −10.5%145 in 2025, from 162
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.
Gilbert in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Gilbert in French — same name
- Gilberto in Spanish — same name
- Gilberto in Italian — same name
- Giselbert in German — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Arizona.
Gilberts among us
people named Gilbert are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 11,780 born in 2025 was named Gilbert
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 Wilbur test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Gilbert's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Wilbur climbed just as high around 1913, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Wilbur's path sketches the road Gilbert is walking now.
Gilbert 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 Gilbert is headed
Gilbert 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.
Gilbert beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Gilbert in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Gil and Bert both detach and sound nothing like each other.
- The meaning is documented all the way back and has not shifted.
- It works in English, French, Spanish and Portuguese without being rebuilt.
- English and Spanish say the initial letter completely differently.
- It reads as distinctly old-fashioned in English, though it is common in Spanish-speaking families.
- It is recorded for daughters too, though very rarely.
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What they receive
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Gilbert
Masculine · #1328 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Gilberts are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 64,500 people named Gilbert are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Gilbert in 2025?
- Gilbert ranks #1328 among US boy names in 2025, with 145 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Gilbert?
- About 1 in every 11,780 US boys born in 2025 was named Gilbert — 145 in all.
- Will my child share the name Gilbert with classmates?
- Gilbert will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Gilbert
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Francesco#1328 · Sanad#1328 · Gus#1328 · Elvis#1328 · Bryant#1323 · Lucio#1323 · London#1333 · Noble#1333
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Gilbert? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Gilbert and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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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
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