Aidan

108,843 people in America carry this name — ranked #522 of 923.

A name being given more often than it was a generation ago.

Say it AY dahn

2 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part

Phonetic transcription

EY1 D AA0 N — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.

  • People counted 108,843 2020 Census
  • Rank #522 Common
  • As a surname No not above the reporting threshold

Where Aidan comes from and what it means

Celtic in origin, reading literally as “fire”.

Origins are a matter of scholarly argument rather than record, and a name can be traced more than one way. We state one reading and say where it came from.

Aidan name popularity by year

115,404 babies were given this name since 1936. The busiest year was 2003, with 10,295 of them.

30 50 60 70 80 90 00s 10 20

Most people carrying it were born in the 2000s. It has been given less often of late.

Counted from Social Security card applications, so it covers births registered in the United States and leaves out names given to fewer than five babies in a year.

Middle names that fit Aidan

Two syllables sit with almost anything — the join matters more than the length.

Better avoided

  • Aidan Andrew — same opening
  • Aidan Anthony — same opening
  • Aidan Nicholas — runs together

Chosen by sound from the pronouncing dictionary, then ordered by how often the name is given. None of it is a rule — the ear decides.

On the way up

Aidan is given more often now than it was a generation ago. Most names move the other way.

Boys or girls: who is called Aidan?

97.7% men
2,552 women

As recorded on census returns, not as anyone thinks the name ought to be used.

Names with the same rhythm as Aidan

Nothing else in the file ends on the same sound — a rare thing, and useful if you want a first name nobody will echo.

Same rhythm — 2 syllables, stress on the first

Matched on phonemes, not spelling, so the lists follow the ear rather than the page.

The same name elsewhere

  • Aed Welsh
  • Edan Scottish
  • Aedh Irish
  • Edanus Latin

Forms of one name traced to the same root. Spellings are as the glossary printed them, so some look older than the versions in use today.

Names about as common

The nearest entries above and below by number of people.

Who carries it today

  • White alone (non-Hispanic) — 70.3%
  • Black or African American alone (non-Hispanic) — 3.4%
  • Hispanic or Latino origin — 15.1%
  • Two or more races — 6.9%
  • Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone — 3.7%
  • American Indian and Alaska Native alone — 0.5%

Categories are how people answered the census — a fact about the bearers, not a property of the name. Conclusions are ours, not the Census Bureau’s.

Full names people carry

The census counts first names and surnames separately and never together, so these are estimates: how often the two halves would meet if they paired at random. They do not — names cluster by community — so read them as an order of magnitude, not a headcount.

The states where Aidan is most common

In Rhode Island the name is given 2.1 times as often as it is across the country.

  • Rhode Island ×2.1
  • New Hampshire ×2.1
  • Massachusetts ×1.8
  • Nevada ×1.5
  • Delaware ×1.5

Measured against the state's own share of births since 1960, so a small state can lead a big one. Counted from Social Security card applications.

Try it Compare Two Names

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Where this page gets its numbers

  • Counts, ranks and shares: U.S. Census Bureau, 2020 Census tabulations of first and last names occurring 100 or more times. Percentages, bands and groupings are our own arithmetic — the conclusions are ours, not the Bureau’s.
  • Pronunciation, syllables and rhyme groups: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, Carnegie Mellon University. The plain-English respelling is ours.
  • Origins and the forms a name takes in other languages: Charlotte Yonge, History of Christian Names, 1884 — a public-domain work. Scholarship has moved on since, so read it as one reading of a name, not the last word.

Below a hundred people we publish no figure at all — the same threshold the Census Bureau applies to us. What each source covers
Other names of Celtic origin