Tate
Masculine · “cheerful”
Tate is given to both — 27,400 boys and 1,555 girls since 1880. See Tate as a girl nameSee other names given to both
Tate began as a family name in the north of England, carried there by Norse settlers whose word for glad became a person's name. It is one syllable, one clean vowel, and it lands the same way in every mouth — no second guess about spelling, no second guess about stress. Most people meet it first on the front of a London museum, given by the Victorian sugar merchant Henry Tate, whose gallery opened at the end of the nineteenth century.
How old is the name Tate?
Tate first appears in US birth records in 1912 — 113 years ago. The typical Tate is a kid of about 12 — this name's wave is very recent. About 27,000 people named Tate are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Tate most popular?
Tate peaked in 2025, reaching #193 nationally. Today it ranks #193, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Where it comes from
From Teitr to Tate
The story of Tate
The name spread first as a surname across northern England and lowland Scotland, where Norse settlement was heaviest, appearing in records as both Tate and Tait. Its most public bearer was Henry Tate, the Liverpool sugar refiner who gave Britain the gallery that still carries the name. In the United States it followed the well-worn path of English surnames turned first names, arriving quietly on the birth records early in the twentieth century and staying rare for decades. Its real growth as a given name is recent, and it has climbed steadily rather than exploding.
Meaning
cheerful, glad
The root reaches English through the Old Norse personal name Teitr, meaning glad or cheerful, reinforced by a related Old English name element with the same sense. Two roads, one meaning.
How the name formed
- Teitr
- Tait
- Tate
Related forms: Tait · Teitr · Tayte
Pronouncing Tate
TAYT
Rhymes with eight and late. One syllable, and the spelling gives it away on sight — misreadings are close to impossible.
Nicknames for Tate
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
- 1912
- Most boys named
- 20251,862 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #193reached in 2025
- Change vs 2023
- +0.4%1,862 in 2025, from 1,854
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.
Tate in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Tait in Scots / Northern English — spelling variant
- Teitr in Old Norse — related form
- Tayte in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, Ohio, California.
Tates among us
people named Tate are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 917 born in 2025 was named Tate
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 Tommie test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Tate's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Tommie climbed just as high around 1909, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Tommie's path sketches the road Tate is walking now.
Tate 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 Tate is headed
Tate looks set to keep climbing gently, with roughly 40% more babies a year by 2030 if the current curve holds.
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.
Tate beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Tate in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled exactly as it sounds, so it survives phone calls, roll calls and forms without correction.
- One syllable, which makes it easy to pair with longer or multi-syllable surnames.
- A documented history as a surname in northern England and Scotland going back to Norse settlement.
- Recognizable across English-speaking countries, helped by the London gallery that shares the spelling.
- Needs no nickname to work, and has no awkward long form behind it.
- The surname is currently attached to a widely discussed internet personality, and some adults will hear that before anything else. Associations like this tend to fade, but it is worth knowing now rather than later.
- This spelling goes to boys in nearly every case. A girl named Tate will often be read as a boy on paperwork and rosters, which some families welcome and others would rather avoid.
- Rhymes are plentiful and obvious — late, great, eight — and Tater turns up quickly on playgrounds. It is gentle teasing rather than cruel, but it does turn up.
- Still surname-shaped enough that people occasionally ask for the first name after you have already given it.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Tate
Masculine · #193 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Tates are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 27,000 people named Tate are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Tate in 2025?
- Tate ranks #193 among US boy names in 2025, with 1,862 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Tate?
- About 1 in every 917 US boys born in 2025 was named Tate — 1,862 in all.
- Will my child share the name Tate with classmates?
- Tate will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Tate
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Legend#193 · Chase#192 · Alan#191 · Alejandro#195 · Callan#190 · Knox#196 · Ashton#197 · Maxwell#189
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Tate? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Tate and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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