How popular is the baby name Louise in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Use the popularity graph and data table below to find out! Plus, see all the blog posts that mention the name Louise.

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Popularity of the baby name Louise


Posts that mention the name Louise

Popular baby names in the Philippines, 2022

Flag of the Philippines
Flag of the Philippines

In 2022, the Philippines welcomed 1,455,393 babies.

What were the most popular names among these babies? Althea and Nathaniel, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority.

Here are the country’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names of 2022:

Girl names

  1. Althea, 1,935 baby girls
  2. Angel, 1,388
  3. Samantha, 1,314
  4. Princess, 1,110
  5. Nathalie, 1,094
  6. Chloe, 1,056
  7. Sofia, 1,046
  8. Zia, 984
  9. Athena, 983
  10. Sophia, 973

Boy names

  1. Nathaniel, 1,956 baby boys
  2. Jacob, 1,781
  3. Ezekiel, 1,662
  4. Gabriel, 1,583
  5. Nathan, 1,557
  6. Ethan, 1,359
  7. Noah, 1,322
  8. Liam, 1,198
  9. James, 1,151
  10. Matthew, 1,138

In the girls’ top 10, Zia and Athena replaced Andrea and Angela.

In the boys’ top 10, Noah and Liam replaced Angelo and Zion.

And which baby names saw the biggest jumps in usage?

  • Noah, which rose from 931 to 1,322 baby boys [2021 to 2022]
  • Avianna Louise, which rose from 11 to 295 baby girls [2021 to 2022]

Avianna Louise’s extreme increase must be attributable to something, though I’m not sure what.

In lieu of that, here’s some fun data from a 2017 infographic (PDF) showing how beauty queens have influenced girl names in the Philippines over the years.

In 1974 and 1994 — the first two times that the Philippines hosted the Miss Universe pageant — babies were named after both the delegate from the Philippines and the delegate who won the pageant:

NameDelegateUsage Increase (baby girls)
GuadalupeGuadalupe Sanchez
Miss Philippines 1974		46 to 87
[1973 to 1974]
AmparoAmparo Muñoz (of Spain)
Miss Universe 1974		127 to 689
[1973 to 1974]
CharleneCharlene Gonzales
Miss Philippines 1994		1,345 to 4,178
[1993 to 1994]
SushmitaSushmita Sen (of India)
Miss Universe 1994		3 to 535
[1993 to 1994]

And in 1969, 1973, and 2015, the delegate from the Philippines was the winner of the pageant:

NameDelegateUsage increase (baby girls)
GloriaGloria Diaz
Miss Universe 1969		3,100 to 3,413
[1968 to 1969]
Margarita or Margie
(not specified)		Margarita “Margie” Moran
Miss Universe 1973		1,706 to 2,351
[1972 to 1973]
PiaPia Wurtzbach
Miss Universe 2015		621 to 925
[2015 to 2016]

A fourth Filipina, Catriona Gray, won Miss Universe (and likewise influenced baby names) in 2018.

Sources: Most Common Baby Names of 2022 – Philippine Statistics Authority (PDF), Registered Live Births in the Philippines, 2022 – Philippine Statistics Authority

Image: Adapted from Flag of the Philippines (public domain)

Where did the baby name Anfernee come from in 1992?

Basketball player Anfernee Hardaway
Anfernee Hardaway

The curious name Anfernee debuted in the U.S. baby name data in 1992 and reached peak usage in 1996:

  • 1998: 102 baby boys named Anfernee
  • 1997: 171 baby boys named Anfernee [rank: 838th]
  • 1996: 300 baby boys named Anfernee [rank: 597th]
  • 1995: 246 baby boys named Anfernee [rank: 669th]
  • 1994: 84 baby boys named Anfernee
  • 1993: 42 baby boys named Anfernee
  • 1992: 21 baby boys named Anfernee [debut]
  • 1991: unlisted

This corresponds to the rise of Tennessee-born basketball player Anfernee “Penny” Hardaway.

He played for two seasons at Memphis State before being selected third overall in the 1993 NBA draft.

As a professional, Anfernee spent his first six seasons with the Orlando Magic. During that time, he was voted an NBA All-Star four times in a row, from 1995 to 1998.

So how did he come to be called “Anfernee”? Here’s how his mother, Fae, explained it:

When I was in school at Lester High, there had been a boy named Anfernee. I always thought it was such a beautiful name. People think I don’t know how to spell Anthony. His nickname, Penny? That came from Mama. She called him Pretty, but in the country, that comes out ‘Pweddy.’ People just took it from there.

(Anfernee was raised largely by Fae’s mother, Louise, a former sharecropper.)

Among Anfernee Hardaway’s namesakes are baseball player Anfernee Grier (born in 1995), basketball player Anfernee Simons (b. 1999), and football players Anfernee Jennings (b. 1996) and Anfernee Orji (b. 2000).

What are your thoughts on the name Anfernee?

Sources:

Image: Anfernee Hardaway trading card

Popular baby names in Monaco, 2023

Flag of Monaco
Flag of Monaco

In 2023, the Western European microstate of Monaco welcomed 804 babies — 388 baby girls and 416 baby boys. All of these babies were born in Monaco’s single public hospital, the Centre Hospitalier Princesse Grace (which was named after Grace Kelly).

Notably, though, only 229 them were born to residents of Monaco. The other 575 were born to non-residents, most of whom came from the nearby French communes of Menton, Roquebrune-Cap-Martin, and Beausoleil.

So, what were the most popular names among the (mostly French) babies born in Monaco last year? Louise and Théo.

Here are Monaco’s top 5 girl names and top 5 boy names of 2023:

Girl names

  1. Louise
  2. Chloé
  3. Emma
  4. Jade
  5. Chiara

Boy names

  1. Théo
  2. Gabriel
  3. Léo
  4. Leonardo
  5. Andrea

Last year’s newborns included “the latest member of the Grimaldi family” — a baby girl named Victoire, born in April to Louis Ducruet (the son of Princess Stéphanie, whose brother, Prince Albert, is the current head of state). The House of Grimaldi has been the reigning house of the Principality of Monaco since the late 13th century.

In 2022, the top names in Monaco were Emma and Leonardo.

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Flag of Monaco (public domain)

What gave the baby name Madonna a boost in the mid-1980s?

Madonna's album "Like a Virgin" (1984)
Madonna album

From the early 1900s to the late 1960s, Madonna was one of the top 1,000 girl names in the United States. In terms of rankings, it was most popular in the 1930s; in terms of raw numbers of births, it was most popular in the ’50s and ’60s.

The name has been in decline ever since, but it did see a sudden spike in usage in 1985:

  • 1987: 61 baby girls named Madonna
  • 1986: 70 baby girls named Madonna
  • 1985: 146 baby girls named Madonna
  • 1984: 63 baby girls named Madonna
  • 1983: 23 baby girls named Madonna

In fact, it almost landed back inside the top 1,000 that year. (It ranked 1,033rd, just seven babies shy of 1,000th place.)

Here’s a visual:

Graph of the usage of the baby name Madonna in the U.S. since 1880
Usage of the baby name Madonna

What gave it a boost?

Mononymous pop superstar Madonna (birth name: Madonna Louise Ciccone).

The singer was born into a Catholic family in Michigan in 1958. She was named after her mother. (Her five siblings are named Anthony, Martin, Paula, Christopher, and Melanie.)

Madonna rose to fame in the mid-1980s with a string of catchy hits:

  • “Holiday,” which peaked at #16 on Billboard‘s Hot 100 chart in January of 1984
  • “Borderline,” which peaked at #10 in June of 1984
  • “Lucky Star,” which peaked at #4 in October of 1984
  • “Like a Virgin,” which peaked at #1 for six weeks starting in December of 1984
  • “Material Girl,” which peaked at #2 in March of 1985
  • “Crazy for You,” which peaked at #1 in May of 1985
    • It was written for the movie Vision Quest, in which Madonna had a cameo.
  • “Angel,” which peaked at #5 in June of 1985
  • “Into the Groove,” which was never technically released as a single
    • It was featured in the movie Desperately Seeking Susan, in which Madonna had a leading role.
  • “Dress You Up,” which peaked at #5 in October of 1985

She also got a lot of exposure on MTV. One of her most memorable MTV moments was the suggestive “Like a Virgin” performance at the very first Video Music Awards (in September of 1984):

In 1991, during a Vanity Fair interview, Madonna posed the question: “How could I be anything else but what I am having been named Madonna?”

Her name is based on the word madonna (which meant “my lady” in Old Italian). Today it’s associated with the Virgin Mary — hence its usage as a given name in Catholic families — but, centuries ago, it was simply a polite form of address similar to madame or milady. (Madonna’s first child, a daughter born in 1996, was also given a Virgin Mary-associated name: Lourdes.)

What are your thoughts on the name Madonna? Would you use it?

Sources:

P.S. Coincidentally, the primary male characters in two of Madonna’s early movies — Vision Quest and Who’s That Girl — had nearly the same (rather uncommon) first name: Louden/Loudon.