Name Generator

How popular is the name Nathaniel?

Births per year, rank history and how many Nathaniels are alive today.

Nathaniel (male) sits just outside the top 100 boys' names in England and Wales, ranked 149th in 2025 with 361 babies given the name. This spelling of the name peaked in 2012, when 536 babies were given the name, the 118th most popular that year. It was almost as popular in 2004, with 483 babies given the name that year. Its fortunes dipped to rank 174 in 2023 before climbing back to the 149th place it holds today. Numbers have been stable in recent years. At least 12,000 babies have been named Nathaniel in England and Wales since 1996. Nathaniel is one spelling of a name also recorded as Nathanial; the combined figures below cover every spelling. Common short forms of Nathaniel include Nate.

Across all spellings of the name, the Nathaniel you are most likely to meet is around 15 years old. Half of all Nathaniels born in England and Wales are between 10 and 27, and there are at least 15,000 of them alive today. If you walk into a room of 100 males, there's roughly a 4.8% chance that at least one of them will be called Nathaniel.

How many babies are named Nathaniel each year?

Includes all spellings: Nathaniel, Nathanial. Figures before 1996 are estimates.

Where does the Nathaniel spelling rank?

Where does the Nathanial spelling rank?

Where this data comes from

Figures from 1996 onwards are the Office for National Statistics' annual baby-name registrations for England and Wales, which record every name given to three or more babies in a year. Figures before 1996 are estimates: the ONS published only top-100 rankings at ten-year intervals back to 1904, so counts for those years are modelled from the rankings, calibrated against Douglas Galbi's long-run research into English name frequencies, and shown with an uncertainty band. Estimates of living bearers combine these birth figures with national life tables and ONS mid-year population estimates.

One limit worth naming: these figures count names as registered at birth. Anyone who changes their name later in life - including trans people, and anyone who adopts a different name by deed poll or simply by use - is not reflected here. Birth registrations record where a name began, not the name a person lives with.