Torrance
Feminine · “at the little hills”
Torrance is given to both — 562 girls and 3,590 boys since 1880. See Torrance as a boy nameSee other names given to both
A torran is a little hill. The Gaelic word names a mound or a hillock, and several places in Scotland are called Torrance for exactly that reason — a village north of Glasgow, another in East Kilbride. The surname came from those places, crossed to America, and eventually gave its name to a large city in California, which is a considerable career for a bump in the ground.
How old is the name Torrance?
Torrance first appears in US birth records in 1975 — 50 years ago. The typical Torrance alive today was born around 2006, making them about 19 years old. About 600 people named Torrance are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Torrance most popular?
Torrance peaked in 2002, reaching #2251 nationally. Today it ranks #13208, 10,957 places below that high. See the whole 2002 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From torran to Torrance
The story of Torrance
Scottish place-surnames reached America in large numbers and moved to the front of the name in the twentieth century. The California city is a separate matter and was named for a man rather than a hill — a Los Angeles developer with the surname, who laid out a planned industrial town in 1912 — so the name's American visibility owes something to a place named after a person named after a place. Torrance appears in birth records from 1940 and peaked in the early 1970s, given mostly to sons and to a real minority of daughters.
Meaning
at the little hills
From the Scottish Gaelic torran, a mound or hillock, in a plural or locative form — so the place of the little hills. It is a plain topographic name of the commonest kind, and Scotland is full of them: Torrance, Torry, Tor and Torphichen all carry the same element.
How the name formed
- torran
- Torrance
Related forms: Torran
Pronouncing Torrance
TOR-runss
Two syllables, stress on the first. Nothing about the spelling causes an English reader difficulty, which is unusual for a Gaelic-derived name of this length.
Nicknames for Torrance
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
- 1975
- Most girls named
- 200273 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2251reached in 2002
- Change vs 2024
- −40.0%6 in 2025, from 10
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.
Torrance in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Torran in Scottish Gaelic — related form
Torrances among us
people named Torrance are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 267,878 born in 2025 was named Torrance
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 Graceann test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Torrance's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Graceann climbed just as high around 1943, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Graceann's path sketches the road Torrance is walking now.
Torrance 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
Torrance beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Torrance in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It has a documented Gaelic word behind it with a concrete, physical meaning.
- Rance and Torr are both usable and belong to different registers.
- It is entirely readable on sight.
- It works for a child of either sex, which the record confirms.
- It is a sizable California city, and Californians will hear the place first.
- Torrence, Torrance and Torence all appear, so the spelling has to be given.
- Most children given this spelling are boys, but a real minority are girls, so rosters will guess.
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What they receive
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Torrance
Feminine · #13208 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Torrances are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 600 people named Torrance are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Torrance in 2025?
- Torrance ranks #13208 among US girl names in 2025, with 6 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Torrance?
- About 1 in every 267,878 US girls born in 2025 was named Torrance — 6 in all.
- Will my child share the name Torrance with classmates?
- Torrance will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Torrance
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
John#13208 · Vinnie#13208 · Margery#13208 · Jossie#13208 · Tressa#13208 · Erie#13208 · Bernadine#13208 · Euna#13208
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Torrance? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Torrance and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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