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William

Pronounced /ˈwɪl.i.əm/

Rank in 2024
#10,292
Born in 2024
9
Peak year
1928 · #368
Origin
Germanic
Also recorded for boys:10,596 in 2024 (#10)

1880 to 2024

Uncommon
025507510018801900192019401960198020002020
Hover or tap the chart for any year. Per 1,000 adjusts for how many babies were born that year.
Compare William with other names

Its story in numbers

  • In 2024, 9 girls were named William, about 1 in every 179,243.
  • It peaked in 1928 with 348 babies, ranked #368.
  • It appears in the very first year of records, 1880.
  • 16,022 girls have been named William since 1880.

Who else has this name

Babies named William per 1,000 born in each generation, on one shared scale.

  1. 0.2
    Greatest
  2. 0.2
    Silent
  3. <0.1
    Boomers
  4. 0.1
    Gen X
  5. <0.1
    Millennials
  6. <0.1
    Gen Z
  7. <0.1
    Gen Alpha

Greatest: 3,385 babies, 0.17 per 1,000. Silent: 3,496 babies, 0.17 per 1,000. Boomers: 2,869 babies, 0.08 per 1,000. Gen X: 2,987 babies, 0.12 per 1,000. Millennials: 1,819 babies, 0.06 per 1,000. Gen Z: 512 babies, 0.02 per 1,000. Gen Alpha: 171 babies, 0.01 per 1,000.

Meaning and origin

From Middle English William, from Anglo-Norman Willame, from Old High German Willahelm, from Proto-Germanic *Wiljahelmaz (> Latin Gulielmus), from Proto-Germanic *wiljô (“will”) + *helmaz (“helmet”), ultimately from the Proto-Indo-European roots *welh₁- (“to choose, wish, want”) and *ḱel- (“to cover, conceal, save”), respectively. Cognate with Dutch Willem, German Wilhelm, etc.; cognate borrowings outside of Germanic include Guillaume and Guillermo.

  • A male given name from the Germanic languages popular since the Norman Conquest.
Origin
Germanic
Say it
/ˈwɪl.i.əm/

From Wiktionary’s entry for William, CC BY-SA 4.0.