Honor
Masculine · “honor”
Honor is given to both — 1,475 boys and 3,129 girls since 1880. See Honor as a girl nameSee other names given to both
Honor is Latin for esteem, and it was among the Puritan virtue names — one of the few that survived the seventeenth century and came back.
How old is the name Honor?
Honor first appears in US birth records in 1952 — 73 years ago. The typical Honor is a kid of about 6 — this name's wave is very recent. About 1,500 people named Honor are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Honor most popular?
Honor peaked in 2021, reaching #1407 nationally. Today it ranks #1808, 401 places below that high. See the whole 2021 chart.
Honor appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From honor to Honor
The story of Honor
Honor was used in medieval England and revived by Puritan families alongside Faith, Hope, Prudence and Temperance. It stayed in Irish use as an anglicization of Onóra. Modern American use is for both sexes and rose from the 2000s among the virtue word-names. It appears in the registers in current use.
Meaning
honor, esteem, dignity
From the Latin honor, 'esteem' or 'public office'. In Rome the cursus honorum was the sequence of magistracies a man climbed, so the word named a career as much as a quality. The English word is ordinary and the meaning transparent.
How the name formed
- honor
- Honor
Related forms: Honour · Onóra · Honoria
Pronouncing Honor
ON-ur
Two syllables, stress on the first. The h is silent, as in the ordinary English word.
Nicknames for Honor
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
- 1952
- Most boys named
- 2021130 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1407reached in 2021
- Change vs 2024
- −19.3%88 in 2025, from 109
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.
Honor in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Honour in English — spelling variant
- Onóra in Irish — related form
- Honoria in Latin — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida.
Honors among us
people named Honor are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 19,410 born in 2025 was named Honor
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 Roque test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Honor's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Roque climbed just as high around 1977, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Roque's path sketches the road Honor is walking now.
Honor 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 Honor is headed
Honor 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.
Honor beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Honor in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The cursus honorum sense — honor as a career of offices — is genuinely interesting.
- It belongs to a documented family of English virtue names.
- Two clean syllables with no pronunciation risk.
- It is an ordinary English noun and carries an expectation.
- It is thoroughly unisex and reads as feminine to many people.
- The silent h will cause spelling problems.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Honor to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Honor
Masculine · #1808 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Honors are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,500 people named Honor are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Honor in 2025?
- Honor ranks #1808 among US boy names in 2025, with 88 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Honor?
- About 1 in every 19,410 US boys born in 2025 was named Honor — 88 in all.
- Will my child share the name Honor with classmates?
- Honor will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Honor
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Gentry#1808 · Tamir#1808 · Alakai#1808 · Callaway#1808 · Arsiah#1808 · Avrohom#1808 · Tyree#1808 · Presley#1808
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Honor? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Honor 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
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