John (given Name) - Name Statistics

Name Statistics

John has been a common given name in English speaking countries, and either it or William was the number one name in England and English speaking North America from around 1550 until the middle of the twentieth century.

John was the most popular name given to male infants in the United States until 1924, and though its use has fallen off gradually since then, John was still the 20th most common name for boys on the Social Security Administration's list of names given in 2006. In modern times John is the most common name in the United States, borne as a first or middle name by 39.93 people per thousand; of these, 72.86% have it as the given name. When the statistics of the name are compared to the population statistics of America, the approximate number of people named John in the USA is 12,328,091 and the number of Johns in the USA is increasing by 104,925 each year.

John was also long the most common male name in the United Kingdom, but by 2004 it had fallen out of the top 50 names for newborn boys in England and Wales. By contrast Jack, which was a nickname for John but is now established as a name in its own right, was the most popular name given to newborn boys in England and Wales every year from 1995 to 2005. However, John has not been a popular one for members of the royal family. The memory of King John is tainted by his role as villain in the Robin Hood stories; Prince John, the youngest son of Edward VII, died shortly after birth; and The Prince John, the youngest son of George V, died at age 13. It was reported that Diana, Princess of Wales wished to name her first son (who was ultimately named Prince William) after her own father, John Spencer, but was dissuaded by royal tradition.