Where the names come from

Birth records

Every count, rank and curve comes from the US Social Security Administration’s national baby name data, 1880 through 2024. The SSA lists every name given to at least 5 babies of one sex in a year, based on Social Security card applications.

Hello World Names keeps the 9,536 name records with at least 1,500 births in total. Very rare names are left out, and the data is US-only. The SSA records sex as F or M, so a name used for both appears as two records.

“Per 1,000 babies” divides a name’s births by all babies of the same sex recorded that year, so a name in 1910 and a name in 2024 compare fairly.

Meanings and pronunciation

Origins, etymologies and IPA pronunciations come from English Wiktionary, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0, and link back to each entry. About 4,400 names have an entry. When a name has none, we say so instead of guessing.

Use Hello World Names from Claude or ChatGPT

Hello World Names runs an MCP server, so an AI assistant can search names, read a name’s history and meaning, compare trends, and mix parents’ names with real numbers instead of guessing.

Server URL

https://helloworldnames.com/mcp

Claude Code

claude mcp add --transport http helloworldnames https://helloworldnames.com/mcp

Claude Desktop, Cursor and other clients

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "helloworldnames": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "mcp-remote",
        "https://helloworldnames.com/mcp"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Tools

search_names: filter by sex, letters, origin and trend
get_name: one name’s numbers, generations, meaning and spellings
compare_names: births by decade for up to six names
mix_parent_names: real names that carry letters from both parents
trending_names: rising, cooling and vintage revivals