Winter
Masculine · “winter”
Winter is given to both — 1,037 boys and 15,619 girls since 1880. See Winter as a girl nameSee other names given to both
Winter may mean the wet season — the Germanic word is connected to a root about water, which is what a northern European winter mostly is.
How old is the name Winter?
Winter first appears in US birth records in 1974 — 51 years ago. The typical Winter is a kid of about 9 — this name's wave is very recent. About 1,000 people named Winter are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Winter most popular?
Winter peaked in 2025, reaching #1976 nationally. Today it ranks #1976, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From winter to Winter
The story of Winter
Germanic peoples counted years in winters rather than summers, which is why English still says a person is so many winters old in older poetry. Season names rose in American naming from the 1970s — Summer, Autumn, Winter — and Winter appears in the registers for both sexes in current use.
Meaningscholars disagree
winter, the wet season
From the Old English winter, shared across the Germanic languages. It is generally connected to a root meaning 'wet' — the season named for rain rather than cold, which fits north-western Europe. A connection to 'white' is also proposed. Neither is fully settled.
How the name formed
- winter
- Winter
Related forms: Winter · Winter · Wynter
Pronouncing Winter
WIN-tur
Two syllables, stress on the first. It is a homophone of the ordinary English noun.
Nicknames for Winter
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
- 1974
- Most boys named
- 202577 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1976reached in 2025
- Change vs 2024
- +26.2%77 in 2025, from 61
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.
Winter in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Winter in German — same name
- Winter in Dutch — same name
- Wynter in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, New York, Texas.
Winters among us
people named Winter are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 22,183 born in 2025 was named Winter
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Winter
- #1976
- Winter on the 2025 chart
- #834
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Winter went to 77 boys in 2025, but Wynter is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 94, which makes it the 834th most-given boys’ name of the year — 1,142 places above the chart.
- Winter77
- Wynter17
About 1 boy in 18,171 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 22,183 for Winter 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 Filbert test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Winter's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Filbert climbed just as high around 1938, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Filbert's path sketches the road Winter is walking now.
Winter 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 Winter is headed
Winter 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.
Winter beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Winter in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- That the word may mean 'wet' rather than 'cold' is a genuinely good detail.
- Counting years in winters is a real and documented Germanic habit.
- Two clean syllables with no pronunciation risk.
- It is an ordinary English noun and reads as one.
- It is thoroughly unisex and reads as more feminine in America.
- The etymology is genuinely disputed.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Winter
Masculine · #1976 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Winters are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Winter are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Winter?
- Winter is the most-used spelling in US records — 77 of the 94 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Wynter.
- How popular is the name Winter in 2025?
- Winter ranks #1976 among US boy names in 2025, with 77 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Winter?
- About 1 in every 22,183 US boys born in 2025 was named Winter — 77 in all.
- Will my child share the name Winter with classmates?
- Winter will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Winter
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Donte#1976 · Davon#1976 · Jacobo#1976 · Khyree#1976 · Kru#1976 · Jaleel#1976 · Arrow#1976 · Yug#1976
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Winter? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Winter and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
Compare side by sideIn a hurry? Just pick a winner — one tap, no sign-up, and you see how everyone else voted.
Weighing a whole shortlist? Add the rest in the builder, or settle it with a bracket.
Cast your vote
Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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