Quentin
Masculine · “fifth”
Quentin is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 43,472 boys against 190 girls since 1880.
Quentin began as a Roman counting name — Quintus, the fifth — and left Latin for good when a third-century missionary martyred in northern Gaul made it a saint's name. The town of Saint-Quentin in Picardy still carries it, and the Normans carried it to England. In the mouth it is two clean beats, a hard consonant opening onto a soft ending, and it has been shortened the same easy way for generations.
How old is the name Quentin?
Quentin first appears in US birth records in 1900 — 125 years ago. The typical Quentin alive today was born around 1995, making them about 30 years old. About 37,500 people named Quentin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Quentin most popular?
Quentin peaked in 1919, reaching #220 nationally. Today it ranks #965, 745 places below that high. See the whole 1919 chart.
Quentin appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From Quintus to Quentin
The story of Quentin
Roman families used plain numbers for sons, and Quintus was among the most common of them; Quintinus was its affectionate diminutive. A Christian missionary of that name was killed in Roman Gaul in the third century, and the place of his burial grew into the Picard town of Saint-Quentin, which fixed the name firmly in French. From there the Normans brought it into England after 1066, where it survived quietly for centuries as both a given name and a surname. Sir Walter Scott's novel Quentin Durward, published in 1823, put it back in front of English readers and gave the spelling a second life in the English-speaking world.
Meaning
fifth
Quentin comes from the Latin Quintinus, a diminutive of Quintus, 'fifth' — one of the Roman names given by order of birth, alongside Sextus and Decimus.
How the name formed
- Quintus
- Quintinus
- QuentinOld French
- QuentinEnglish
Related forms: Quentin · Quintinus · Quintín · Quintino · Quinten · Quinton
Pronouncing Quentin
KWEN-tin
Stress on the first syllable. Some speakers reduce the ending to KWEN-tn. The French pronunciation is quite different — roughly kahn-TAN, with both vowels nasal — worth knowing if there is French in the family.
Nicknames for Quentin
High
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
- 1900
- Most boys named
- 19981,052 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #220reached in 1919
- Change vs 2023
- −29.2%238 in 2025, from 336
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.
Quentin in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Quentin in French — same name
- Quintinus in Latin — same name
- Quintín in Spanish — same name
- Quintino in Italian — same name
- Quinten in Dutch — spelling variant
- Quinton in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Ohio.
Quentins among us
people named Quentin are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 7,177 born in 2025 was named Quentin
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 Erwin test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Quentin's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Erwin climbed just as high around 1901, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Erwin's path sketches the road Quentin is walking now.
Quentin 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 Quentin is headed
Quentin is easing off slowly — about 19% 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.
Quentin beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Quentin in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A continuous written record from Roman Latin to the present, with no gap and no reconstruction needed.
- Works unchanged in French and English, and has close cousins in Spanish, Italian and Dutch.
- Established short forms already in use: Quent, Q, Quinn.
- Familiar enough that nobody has to ask what it is, while a child is unlikely to share it with a classmate.
- Quinton is a long-standing rival spelling, so expect to correct it — and to be asked which one you mean. Saying "Quentin with an E" gets it done in one breath.
- San Quentin, the California state prison, is the loudest association for many American ears, and California is one of the states where the name is most used. The link is only to the place name, but it comes up.
- The name has been drifting down from its early-twentieth-century high point for a long while, which means most people carrying it are grown adults rather than children — familiar as a name, uncommon as a classmate.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Quentin to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Quentin
Masculine · #965 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Quentins are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 37,500 people named Quentin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Quentin in 2025?
- Quentin ranks #965 among US boy names in 2025, with 238 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Quentin?
- About 1 in every 7,177 US boys born in 2025 was named Quentin — 238 in all.
- Will my child share the name Quentin with classmates?
- Quentin will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Quentin
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Mordechai#965 · Colten#965 · Arian#965 · Imran#969 · Shimon#960 · Wallace#960 · Beaux#970 · Darwin#960
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Quentin? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Quentin and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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