Ulises
Masculine
Ulises is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 11,944 boys against 15 girls since 1880.
Ulises is the Spanish form of a name that has been in continuous use since Homer's Odyssey — the traveler who took ten years to get home. It came into Spanish through Latin Ulixes and Ulysses rather than straight from the Greek, which is why it begins with that soft oo- instead of the O- of Odysseus. Three syllables, all of them open, and the stress landing gently in the middle: oo-LEE-ses.
How old is the name Ulises?
Ulises first appears in US birth records in 1954 — 71 years ago. The typical Ulises alive today was born around 2006, making them about 19 years old. About 11,500 people named Ulises are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Ulises most popular?
Ulises peaked in 1999, reaching #503 nationally. Today it ranks #1038, 535 places below that high. See the whole 1999 chart.
Where it comes from
From Odysseus to Ulises
The story of Ulises
The name belongs first to the hero of the Iliad and the Odyssey, the one who thought up the wooden horse and then spent a decade at sea. Greek Odysseus reached Italy in an altered form — Etruscan Uluxe — and Latin took it up as Ulixes and Ulysses, the spelling that later gave English its Ulysses and titled James Joyce's 1922 novel. Spanish and Portuguese kept the Latin U- and softened the rest into Ulises and Ulisses, and Italian into Ulisse. In the United States the name has been carried chiefly by Spanish-speaking families, which is why it shows most strongly in California, Texas and Arizona.
Meaningscholars disagree
Traditionally linked to Greek odyssesthai, 'to be angry, to hate'
The Odyssey itself plays on that connection, casting the hero's name as one tied to wrath and grievance — the man hated by gods and hating in return. Many linguists, though, treat Odysseus as pre-Greek, a name older than the language that inherited it, with the Homeric wordplay a later poetic reading rather than a true etymology. The Latin Ulixes appears to have reached Rome through Etruscan Uluxe, which is where the U- comes from.
How the name formed
- Odysseus
- Uluxe
- Ulixes
- Ulysses
- Ulises
Related forms: Odysseas · Ulysses · Ulisse · Ulysse · Ulisses · Ulixes
Pronouncing Ulises
oo-LEE-ses
That is the Spanish pronunciation, and the one the spelling points to. English speakers who know the name mainly as Ulysses sometimes reach for yoo-LISS-eez instead, so expect to correct that occasionally.
Nicknames for Ulises
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
- 1954
- Most boys named
- 2006487 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #503reached in 1999
- Change vs 2024
- −17.1%213 in 2025, from 257
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.
Ulises in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Odysseas in Greek — same name
- Ulysses in English — same name
- Ulisse in Italian — same name
- Ulysse in French — same name
- Ulisses in Portuguese — same name
- Ulixes in Latin — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Arizona.
Ulisess among us
people named Ulises are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 8,019 born in 2025 was named Ulises
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Ulises
- #1038
- Ulises on the 2025 chart
- #673
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Ulises went to 213 boys in 2025, but Ulices and Ulyses are the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 264, which makes it the 673rd most-given boys’ name of the year — 365 places above the chart.
About 1 boy in 6,470 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 8,019 for Ulises 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 Stanford test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Ulises's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Stanford climbed just as high around 1931, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Stanford's path sketches the road Ulises is walking now.
Ulises 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 Ulises is headed
Ulises 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.
Ulises beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Ulises in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Recognizable in Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, French and English, each language having its own settled form of the same name.
- A documented history of roughly three thousand years, from Homeric Greek through Latin to the modern Spanish spelling.
- Spelled exactly as it sounds in Spanish, with one s and no silent letters to explain.
- Comes with a ready short form in Uli, already in ordinary use rather than invented on the spot.
- The English Ulysses and the Spanish Ulises are the same name with different spellings and different pronunciations. In an English-speaking setting, both the extra s and the yoo- start will get offered back to you fairly often.
- It has been stepping back gently from its high point for some time now, so a boy named Ulises will likely be the only one in his year — good if you want that, worth knowing if you don't.
- The literary weight is real: the Odyssey, and Joyce's novel, will come up. Some families enjoy that; others would rather a name arrived without a reading list attached.
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What they receive
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Ulises
Masculine · #1038 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Ulisess are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 11,500 people named Ulises are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Ulises?
- Ulises is the most-used spelling in US records — 213 of the 264 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Ulices and Ulyses.
- How popular is the name Ulises in 2025?
- Ulises ranks #1038 among US boy names in 2025, with 213 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Ulises?
- About 1 in every 8,019 US boys born in 2025 was named Ulises — 213 in all.
- Will my child share the name Ulises with classmates?
- Ulises will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Ulises
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Trenton#1038 · Blaise#1038 · Ernest#1038 · Ren#1038 · Brodie#1038 · Zavier#1034 · Kelvin#1034 · Carmine#1034
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Ulises? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Ulises and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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