Psalm
Masculine · Greek roots · “a sacred song”
Psalm is given to both — 761 boys and 359 girls since 1880. See other names given to both
Psalm is the English word for a sacred song, and it came into the language carrying a harp with it: the Greek psalmos meant the plucking of strings before it meant the words sung over them. The Book of Psalms has been read, chanted and set to new music for more than two thousand years. On the page it looks weighty; in the mouth it is one soft syllable, the P silent, rhyming with calm.
How old is the name Psalm?
Psalm first appears in US birth records in 1999 — 26 years ago. Psalm is overwhelmingly a brand-new baby name right now — most Psalms are still in diapers. About 800 people named Psalm are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Psalm most popular?
Psalm peaked in 2025, reaching #1108 nationally. Today it ranks #1108, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Psalm appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From psallein (Greek, 'to pluck') to Psalm
The story of Psalm
When the Greek translators of the Hebrew Bible needed a word for the songs gathered as Tehillim, they chose psalmos — a term from the plucking of a stringed instrument. Latin took it as psalmus and Old English as sealm; the Greek spelling, silent P and all, was restored later in English. For most of its life the word stayed a common noun, spoken in churches and synagogues rather than written on birth certificates. Its use as a given name is a recent American development, part of a broader habit of taking words straight from scripture, and it is most concentrated in Texas, California and Florida.
Meaning
a sacred song, sung to the plucking of strings
From Greek psalmos, from psallein, 'to pluck a string'. The Hebrew collection it names is Tehillim, 'praises'.
How the name formed
- psalleinGreek, 'to pluck'
- psalmos
- psalmusLatin
- sealmOld English
- Psalm
Related forms: Salmo · Psaume · Salmo · Salmo · Psalm · Psalmos
Pronouncing Psalm
SAHM
The P is silent, as it is in psychology. Most American speakers rhyme it with calm and palm; sounding the L, SAHLM, is also common, and neither version is wrong.
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
- 1999
- Most boys named
- 2025194 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1108reached in 2025
- Change vs 2024
- +9.6%194 in 2025, from 177
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.
Psalm in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Salmo in Spanish — related form
- Psaume in French — related form
- Salmo in Italian — related form
- Salmo in Portuguese — related form
- Psalm in German — same name
- Psalmos in Greek — transliteration
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Florida.
Psalms among us
people named Psalm are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 8,805 born in 2025 was named Psalm
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 Jeanpaul test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Psalm's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Jeanpaul climbed just as high around 1973, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Jeanpaul's path sketches the road Psalm is walking now.
Psalm is climbing fast right now. Steep climbs tend to come with steep descents — the quicker a name arrives, the more firmly it belongs to its moment.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Psalm is headed
Psalm is on a steep climb — if the curve holds, 2030 could see around 149% more babies given the name than today. Its history is short or jumpy, though, so read this as a sketch rather than a promise.
Low 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.
Psalm beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Psalm in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- One syllable ending in a consonant, so it sits easily in front of almost any middle name or surname.
- The word itself is familiar to English speakers, so the pronunciation usually needs explaining only once.
- Recognizable well beyond English: Salmo in Spanish, Italian and Portuguese, Psaume in French, Psalm unchanged in German.
- Short enough that there is nothing to shorten — no nickname will be imposed at school.
- A child with this name will almost certainly be the only one in the building.
- The silent P is the practical cost. Heard aloud, it will be written Salm or Sam, and spelling it out on the phone becomes a lifelong small habit.
- It is unmistakably scriptural, and it stays that way — at a christening, on a job application, in a courtroom. For some families that is precisely the point; it is worth deciding on purpose rather than by default.
- It is also an ordinary English noun, so some readers will register the word before the person, and a few will read it aloud as such.
- As a given name it is genuinely new, which means nearly everyone carrying it is still a small child. There are no adult namesakes to point to yet — that generation is only now being born.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Psalm
Masculine · Greek roots · #1108 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Psalms are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 800 people named Psalm are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Psalm in 2025?
- Psalm ranks #1108 among US boy names in 2025, with 194 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Psalm?
- About 1 in every 8,805 US boys born in 2025 was named Psalm — 194 in all.
- Will my child share the name Psalm with classmates?
- Psalm will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Psalm
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Cullen#1108 · Kanan#1108 · Thatcher#1108 · Justice#1112 · Sami#1112 · Cashton#1112 · Kase#1115 · Terry#1115
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Psalm? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Psalm and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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