There’s a new sheriff in town. America’s fastest-rising baby name is pure modern cowboy:
Dutton.
The neo-western tv series Yellowstone follows the travails of the Dutton family on their Montana ranch. When country singer Chris Lane named his baby son Dutton in 2021, it highlighted the name’s potential and cemented its western bonafides.
Dutton leads a cowboyful list of rising boys’ names, including Yellowstone Dutton family name Kayce, fellow TV neo-western name Walker, Old West explorer name Colter, and hat classic Stetson. Beyond the cowboys, you’ll find the Hawaiian name Koa and French soccer star name Kylian.
For girls, the hot name element of the year is Wren. The #1 and #2 top risers are Wrenlee and Wrenley, and Wren itself is #15. The Latina names Arlet and Arleth also both ranked among the top risers. In a super-rare coincidence, the Arabic (and Japanese) name Amiri is the #8 fastest riser for both boys and girls.
The full top-rising list:
| BOYS | GIRLS | |
| #1 | Dutton | Wrenlee |
| #2 | Kayce | Wrenley |
| #3 | Eithan | Alora |
| #4 | Walker | Arlet |
| #5 | Stetson | Neriah |
| #6 | Koa | Georgina |
| #7 | Kylian | Arleth |
| #8 | Amiri | Amiri |
| #9 | Colter | Amayah |
| #10 | Theo | Lainey |
Other movers and shakers of note:
- Love makes its all-time debut in the top 1000, at #754 for girls
- Millie jumps up to #127, the highest the name has ever ranked
- Chosen is now a top-1000 name for boys
10 Comments
I’ve noticed that these rankings of fastest-rising names are a bit different from those on the Social Security website, which are ordered by change in ranking. Are these rankings comparing the actual change in number of births from 2021 to 2022, as opposed to change in ranking?
Letterkenny, Namerology uses a hybrid “hotness formula” that takes into account both the percent change in usage and the absolute number of babies affected. Change in ranking vastly overweights rare names and can make modest jumps look enormous, while ignoring changes like Ava falling by 1,720 babies (but just 2 ranking spots).
For this list, only names that ranked in the top 1,000 for boys or girls in 2022 were considered. New names/rare risers will be discussed soon!
Thanks for the explanation. Can’t wait to read more!
Ooh, I’m interested in Arlet and Arleth. It looks like Arlet is the Catalan form of the French name Arlette, which is a name in my family tree. Both are descended from the Germanic name Herleva. Is Arleth a Latin American variant? I’m excited to see forgotten traditional names being revived.
As an Australian reader this was amusing, as the name Dutton has a very different connotation and it will definitely not catch on here any time soon. It is the surname of a particularly odious man – the leader of the conservative party in our federal parliament. As if his personality and politics weren’t bad enough he also bears more than a passing resemblance to Voldemort.
Wow, a quick image search says you’re not wrong about Voldemort!
I did NOT expect this to be so accurate but holy cow!! 😂
Dutton is great! So are conservatives here!
They forgot about Rip…already have a lil boy named John rip at my church from the show
Those’s names are great for boys and also the girls names are adorable 🥰