Lory
Feminine · “from Laura or Lorraine”
Lory is given to both — 2,258 girls and 267 boys since 1880. See other names given to both
A lory is a bird before it is anything else in English: a small, violently colored parrot of the Pacific islands and northern Australia, with a tongue like a brush. The name here almost certainly comes from Laura or Lorraine rather than from the bird, but the word was the bird's first.
How old is the name Lory?
Lory first appears in US birth records in 1923 — 102 years ago. The typical Lory alive today was born around 1964, making them about 61 years old. About 2,000 people named Lory are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Lory most popular?
Lory peaked in 1962, reaching #1050 nationally. See the whole 1962 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Laura to Lory
The story of Lory
The bird is worth a paragraph on its own account. Lories and lorikeets feed almost entirely on nectar and pollen, and their tongues end in a fringe of fine bristles that works like a brush to lift it out of flowers. That specialization has a cost: they cannot process seeds the way other parrots do, and a lory fed on an ordinary parrot diet will sicken and die. It is one of the clearest cases in birds of a design that is superb at one job and helpless at every other. The word came into English from Malay, brought back by traders in the seventeenth century, and it has meant that bird and nothing else ever since.
Meaningscholars disagree
from Laura or Lorraine, depending on the family
Several longer names shorten to this sound and none of them can claim it exclusively. The laurel behind Laura and the region behind Lorraine are unrelated to each other, so the sense depends entirely on which house the name came out of.
How the name formed
- Laura
- Lori
- Lory
Related forms: Lori
Pronouncing Lory
LOR-ee
Two syllables with the stress at the front, said exactly as Lori and Laurie are said. The spelling changes nothing audible at all.
Nicknames for Lory
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
- 1923
- Most girls named
- 1961106 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1050reached in 1962
- Change vs 2019
- +14.3%8 in 2022, from 7
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.
Lory in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Lori in Italian — spelling variant
Lorys among us
people named Lory are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Lory sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- It is short, warm and completely easy to say on first hearing.
- The y ending gives it a plainness the other spellings do not have.
- It works equally well for a child and for an adult.
- A doubled r would make it the British word for a truck, and travelers will hear that.
- Lori and Laurie are both standard, so the spelling is queried constantly.
- Most children with this spelling are girls, but a real minority are boys; either may be taken for the other.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Lory 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 Lory? Hide it among decoys and let them guess.
What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Lory
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Lorys are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 2,000 people named Lory are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Lory in 2025?
- Lory is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Lory with classmates?
- Lory will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More L names
The most-given names starting with L, all years combined.
Linda#902 · Lisa#987 · Laura#379 · Lauren#401 · Lillian#57 · Lori#1721 · Louise#514 · Lois#1666
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Lory? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Lory 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