Christopher

1,499,872 people in America carry this name — ranked #13 of 923.

A name with a settled sense and a settled sound.

Say it KRIHS tuh fur

3 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part

Phonetic transcription

K R IH1 S T AH0 F ER0 — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.

  • People counted 1,499,872 2020 Census
  • Rank #13 Very common
  • Per 100,000 496.6 about 1 in 221 people
  • As a surname 25,312 ranked #1,369 the other way round

What Christopher means and where it comes from

Greek in origin, reading literally as “Christ bearer”.

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.

How often Christopher has been given

2,052,438 babies were given this name since 1880. The busiest year was 1984, with 60,422 of them.

80 90 00 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80s 90 00 10 20

Most people carrying it were born in the 1980s. 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 Christopher

Three syllables already, so a short middle name keeps the whole from running long.

Better avoided

  • Christopher Robert — runs together
  • Christopher Richard — runs together
  • Christopher Charles — same opening

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.

What Christopher is called for short

Short forms as recorded in a 19th-century glossary of Christian names, so the list is old rather than complete.

Going quiet

Christopher has more than halved in three decades. The people carrying it belong mostly to the Millennials.

Is Christopher used for boys or for girls?

99.9% men
2,214 women

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

How Christopher is spelled

Christopher is how 53% of them spell it — 2,833,836 people answer to the sound.

Each spelling is its own census entry — the counts never overlap, so the shares are of the group, not of the country.

Names about as common

The nearest entries above and below by number of people.

Where the name Christopher is most common in the US

In Vermont the name is given 1.5 times as often as it is across the country.

  • Vermont ×1.5
  • Rhode Island ×1.5
  • Connecticut ×1.4
  • Delaware ×1.4
  • New Hampshire ×1.4

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.

Names built the same way as Christopher

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 — 3 syllables, stress on the first

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

The most common full names

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.

Try it Name Matcher

Enter a surname and hear which first names sit well with it.

The matcher is confident about clashes — rhymes, doubled sounds, colliding stresses — because those are facts about the phonemes. Ordering the names that pass is a set of rules, not a verdict on beauty.

Open Name Matcher on its own page

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 Greek origin