Stanley
A masculine given name derived from an Old English place name, meaning "stony clearing".
Name Census estimates that about 139,218 living Americans carry the first name Stanley. It is a predominantly male name (99.5% of registrations). The average person named Stanley today is around 64 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Stanley births was 1954 (6,472 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Stanley. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
Key insights
- • Although Stanley is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 1,437 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • Compared to the 1950s, recent registration numbers for Stanley have dropped to less than 5% of what they once were.
People living today
139K
~ 1 in 2,462 Americans
Peak year
1954
6,472 babies that year
Average age
64
years old
2024 SSA rank
#875
Tracked since 1880
Gender
Gender distribution for Stanley
Out of the 302,579 babies given the name Stanley since 1880, 99.5% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Stanley as a male name
- Ranked #875 in 2024
- 275 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1954 (6,448 births)
Stanley as a female name
- Ranked #12,753 in 1990
- 6 female births in 1990
- Peak: 1927 (47 births)
Popularity
Stanley: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Stanley from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1950s, with 57,364 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1950s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Stanley by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Stanley during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Stanleys live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois recorded the most babies named Stanley, while Alaska, Nevada, Wyoming recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 5,710 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Stanley
The name Stanley is an English given name derived from the Old English words "stan" meaning stone and "leah" meaning a meadow or clearing. It originates from a place name meaning "stony clearing" or "stone meadow". The name dates back to the 11th century in England.
Stanley was originally a surname before becoming a popular first name. One of the earliest recorded examples is from the Domesday Book of 1086, which mentions a landowner named Steinulf at Stanley in Wiltshire. The name remained primarily a locational surname throughout the medieval period.
The name gained prominence in the 13th century through the Stanley family, an English noble house based in Staffordshire. Sir John Stanley was a notable member who served as King of Mann from 1406 to 1437. Another early bearer was Thomas Stanley, 1st Earl of Derby (c. 1435-1504), a military commander during the Wars of the Roses.
In the 16th century, the name began transitioning into use as a first name, particularly among the Stanley family and other English nobility. One of the earliest recorded examples is Sir William Stanley (c. 1548-1630), an English soldier and explorer who helped establish the first English settlement in America at Roanoke Island.
Other historical figures named Stanley include explorer Sir Henry Morton Stanley (1841-1904), best known for his exploration of central Africa and his search for missionary David Livingstone. Another is Arthur Penrhyn Stanley (1815-1881), a British Anglican bishop and Dean of Westminster Abbey.
Additional notable people with the first name Stanley throughout history include American conductor Stanley Drucker (1929-2022), British actor Stanley Holloway (1890-1982), British musician Stanley Clarke (born 1951), and American baseball player Stanley Coveleski (1889-1984).
Notable bearers
Famous people named Stanley
People
Stanley + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Stanley as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with S
Other first names starting with S with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Stanley: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Stanley?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 139,218 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Stanley going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 2,462 US residents.
Is Stanley a common name?
We classify Stanley as "Common". It ranks above 99.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 302,579 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Stanley most popular?
The single biggest year for Stanley was 1954, when 6,472 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Stanley is about 64 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Stanley a male name?
Yes, 99.5% of people registered as Stanley in the SSA data are male. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.