Kirsten
Feminine · “a Christian”
Kirsten is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 53,181 girls against 212 boys since 1880.
Kirsten is the Danish feminine of Christian, and Danish keeps a distinction English lost: Kristen for men, Kirsten for women, with the r moved.
How old is the name Kirsten?
Kirsten first appears in US birth records in 1937 — 88 years ago. The typical Kirsten alive today was born around 1991, making them about 34 years old. About 51,500 people named Kirsten are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Kirsten most popular?
Kirsten peaked in 1991, reaching #154 nationally. Today it ranks #2822, 2,668 places below that high. See the whole 1991 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From christos to Kirsten
The story of Kirsten
Christina spread through medieval Europe as a devotional name and took particular hold in Scandinavia. Danish produced Kirsten as the feminine and Kristen as the masculine, a distinction that does not survive translation. American families borrowed the Scandinavian K forms heavily from the 1960s, and Kirsten rose through the 1970s and peaked in the early 1980s.
Meaning
a Christian, a follower of Christ
From the Latin Christiana, feminine of Christianus, built on the Greek christos, 'anointed' — itself the translation of the Hebrew title messiah. Danish metathesis moved the r, giving Kirsten from Kristen; the two are the same name with the consonants swapped.
How the name formed
- christos
- Christiana
- Kristen
- Kirsten
Related forms: Kirsten · Kjersti · Kerstin · Kristen
Pronouncing Kirsten
KEER-stin
Two syllables, stress on the first. Some American speakers say KUR-stin instead; Danish uses a clearer first vowel.
Nicknames for Kirsten
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
- 1937
- Most girls named
- 19911,931 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #154reached in 1991
- Change vs 2023
- +66.7%60 in 2025, from 36
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.
Kirsten in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Kirsten in Danish — same name
- Kjersti in Norwegian — related form
- Kerstin in Swedish — related form
- Kristen in English — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Pennsylvania, Texas, California.
Kirstens among us
people named Kirsten are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 26,788 born in 2025 was named Kirsten
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 Tami test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Kirsten's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Tami climbed just as high around 1959, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Tami's path sketches the road Kirsten is walking now.
Kirsten 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 Kirsten is headed
Kirsten is easing off slowly — about 17% 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.
Kirsten beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Kirsten in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A genuine Danish name with a real grammatical distinction behind it.
- Its Scandinavian cousins — Kerstin, Kjersti — are all living names.
- The metathesis story is a genuinely interesting piece of linguistics.
- Two pronunciations of the first vowel are current in English.
- Kristen, Kristin and Kirsten are constantly confused.
- It is closely dated to the 1980s in American records.
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What they receive
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Kirsten
Feminine · #2822 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Kirstens are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 51,500 people named Kirsten are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Kirsten in 2025?
- Kirsten ranks #2822 among US girl names in 2025, with 60 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Kirsten?
- About 1 in every 26,788 US girls born in 2025 was named Kirsten — 60 in all.
- Will my child share the name Kirsten with classmates?
- Kirsten will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Kirsten
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Lya#2822 · Roxanna#2822 · Kensington#2822 · Maybelle#2822 · Hayat#2822 · Seven#2822 · Livie#2822 · Haniya#2822
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Kirsten? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Kirsten and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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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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