Toby
Masculine · “God is good”
Toby is given to both — 34,846 boys and 8,387 girls since 1880. See Toby as a girl nameSee other names given to both
Toby is the everyday English form of Tobias, and it has been in the mouth of English speakers since the Middle Ages — short enough for a shout across a yard, soft enough at the end to be said quietly. Shakespeare gave the name to Sir Toby Belch in Twelfth Night around the turn of the seventeenth century, by which time it was already familiar enough to need no explaining. Two syllables, both of them plain, and nobody has to ask how it is spelled.
How old is the name Toby?
Toby first appears in US birth records in 1882 — 143 years ago. The typical Toby alive today was born around 1978, making them about 47 years old. About 31,000 people named Toby are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Toby most popular?
Toby peaked in 1975, reaching #190 nationally. Today it ranks #977, 787 places below that high. See the whole 1975 chart.
Toby appears on these lists:
- British invasion: UK favorites still rare in the US
- Borrowed from the girls: names boys are taking back
- Cute and cozy names that stay small
- The best baby names starting with T
- all guides
Works in British families too:
Where it comes from
From Toviyyah to Toby
The story of Toby
The name begins as Hebrew Toviyyah and reaches English through Greek, as Tobias, in the Book of Tobit — a text carried in the Septuagint and read across medieval Europe, in which young Tobias travels with an angel and returns to heal his father's blindness. That story was staged in the mystery plays, and the English shortened the hero's name to Tobie and then Toby, which by the sixteenth century was standing on its own as a given name rather than a pet form. English potters later borrowed it for the Toby jug, the seated figure in a tricorn hat produced in Staffordshire from the eighteenth century, and Punch and Judy showmen gave it to their dog — small signs of how thoroughly ordinary and well-liked the name had become. It crossed to America with English settlers and has never entirely left the records since.
Meaning
God is good
From Hebrew Toviyyah, combining tov, "good", with a short form of the divine name.
How the name formed
- Toviyyah
- Tobias
- Tobie
- Toby
Related forms: Tobias · Tobia · Tobie · Tobiasz · Tuvia · Tóbiás
Pronouncing Toby
TOH-bee
Stress on the first syllable. The spelling gives the sound away, in English and in most other languages that use the name.
Nicknames for Toby
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
- 1882
- Most boys named
- 19751,191 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #190reached in 1975
- Change vs 2023
- +48.1%234 in 2025, from 158
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.
Toby in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Tobias in German — same name
- Tobia in Italian — same name
- Tobie in French — same name
- Tobiasz in Polish — same name
- Tuvia in Hebrew — related form
- Tóbiás in Hungarian — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York. International figures from Office for National Statistics. Sources
Tobys among us
people named Toby are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 7,299 born in 2025 was named Toby
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Toby
- #977
- Toby on the 2025 chart
- #672
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Toby went to 234 boys in 2025, but Tobi is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 265, which makes it the 672nd most-given boys’ name of the year — 305 places above the chart.
- Toby234
- Tobi31
About 1 boy in 6,446 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 7,299 for Toby itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Randal test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Toby's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Randal climbed just as high around 1958, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Randal's path sketches the road Toby is walking now.
Toby 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 Toby is headed
Toby should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
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.
Toby beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Toby in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled the way it sounds, and short enough that a child can write it early — no correcting spellings over the phone for life.
- Comes with a ready formal option: Tobias on paper, Toby everywhere else, or Toby alone if you prefer.
- Recognized across English-speaking countries — it charts in England and Wales as well as the US.
- A record in English going back centuries, so it reads as familiar rather than newly minted.
- Uncommon enough now that a Toby is unlikely to share the name with a classmate.
- Toby is already a short form, so if you want a nickname there is not much left to trim — Tobes and Tobs are about the range. Naming him Tobias keeps both doors open.
- It is a well-worn dog name in the US and UK, which most children shrug off but some hear about in a schoolyard.
- In the US the name carries a strand of history through Alex Haley's Roots, where Kunta Kinte is renamed Toby by an enslaver — an association some families will want to have thought about first.
- It has drifted downward in use for a while without ever disappearing, which means it sounds established rather than dated — but expect it to read as a grown man's name to many people before it reads as a baby's.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Toby to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Toby
Masculine · #977 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Tobys are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 31,000 people named Toby are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Toby?
- Toby is the most-used spelling in US records — 234 of the 265 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Tobi.
- How popular is the name Toby in 2025?
- Toby ranks #977 among US boy names in 2025, with 234 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Toby?
- About 1 in every 7,299 US boys born in 2025 was named Toby — 234 in all.
- Will my child share the name Toby with classmates?
- Toby will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Toby
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Azlan#977 · Alec#977 · Byron#980 · Loyal#980 · Damir#980 · Ameer#980 · Mathew#973 · Kaycen#973
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Toby? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Toby and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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