Margaret
Greek margarites, “pearl,” ultimately from an Indo-Iranian word.
Popularity, 1880–2025
Meaning 'pearl,' borne by queens and saints; a top-five fixture from the 1880s into the 1930s.
Margaret appears in the national records from the very first year, 1880. It has ranked among the top 100 names for American girls in 104 different years between 1880 and 1989. It spent 60 years inside the top 10. Its biggest year was 1921, when 28,468 newborn girls received the name, ranking it No. 4 nationally. Its best ranking came in 1891, at No. 3. In 2025 it ranked No. 112 for girls. All told, 1,268,519 Americans have been given the name since 1880.
Related names
Other spellings on record: Margret (10,068), Margarette (6,164), Margarett (4,933), Margarete (2,376), Margarite (1,920), Margurite (1,745) (total births since 1880)
Other names that share a story: Megan, Peggy, Rita, Marjorie, Pearl, Maggie, Mae, Margie
Explore Margaret interactively →By the decade
| Decade | Births | Best rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1880s | 21,799 | No. 4 |
| 1890s | 37,937 | No. 3 |
| 1900s | 57,919 | No. 3 |
| 1910s | 189,234 | No. 3 |
| 1920s | 245,011 | No. 4 |
| 1930s | 157,369 | No. 5 |
| 1940s | 173,028 | No. 11 |
| 1950s | 149,582 | No. 15 |
| 1960s | 81,870 | No. 36 |
| 1970s | 31,947 | No. 80 |
| 1980s | 30,352 | No. 89 |
| 1990s | 31,294 | No. 102 |
| 2000s | 23,919 | No. 110 |
| 2010s | 20,036 | No. 127 |
| 2020s | 13,477 | No. 112 |
Births and rank shown for girls, the sex more often given the name. The Social Security Administration omits name–year combinations with fewer than five births.
🍼 Enjoying this? Buy my baby a diaper
Data: U.S. Social Security Administration national baby-name file, 1880–2025.