Why do the mumsnet community hate popular names?

I don't like popular names because I have never met anyone with the same name as myself and so think it must be very strange to share something as personal as a name with anyone else.

I know lots of young Davids, 1 young Sarah and 3 young Victorias. @mathanxiety, and one youngish Mark.

@YourAmberFawn
I'd say (if it's true, which I dispute) it's because a lot of people went through their schooldays as Sarah B, Sarah with and H, Sarah C, Mel A, Mel B, Mel C, Mel D, etc. and they don't want that for their children.

I'd disagree with you there. I don't know a single child with any of those names, and I deal with a lot of children.

I'm an early 80s born child. In primary school there were 4 Rebecca's and 3 Claire⁩s, my name is traditional but not popular. Not in the top 100 and nobody else in school or work with the same name. I choose modern but not popular names for my children that I love

The reason I avoided popular names is because back in the day, Sharon and Tracey were very popular names and now have a chavvy image. Although obviously this image is totally undeserved for most women with these names. I think it is just safer to go with traditional names they are unlikely to be saddled with any issues.

I think how many are in a class or play group is irrelevant. Because your child will grow up, move areas and probably end up working with a lot of people with their name.

I have a popular 80s name, there were two of us in school. Now I work with an endless number of people with the same name as me.

I can only answer for myself.
I like, and would use, many popular and trendy names but not all. I dislike the sound and meanings of some names.
That is just my preference.

Sometimes I am not encouraging of a certain name due to reasons of poor initial combos, sounds clashing with surnames etc. Sometimes those names are popular or trendy - sometimes not.

If my favourite name were in the top ten, I would still use it.
I also love the use of family names, no matter where they come in popularity.

Exactly. There were four other girls with my name in my class of 30 all the way through primary school. It made me feel generic, like an item in a multipack.

Being honest my son who is 26 has a name that I think was number2 or 3 when he was born - classic traditional name as old as the hills- I still like it-and if he was going to be a girl he was going to be Laura -
personally I’m not a fan of really ‘out there’ names but each to his own - a lot of popular names are also quite classic over the years, things like Oliver, Jack, Oscar, max, Lily, Olivia, Amelia etc

@Emanwenym yep- me and hubby both there and in that age bracket -all good solid names!! lol

Ironically lots of the names I really liked but DP vetoed for being too out there are in the top 100. DS’s solid family name turns out to be unusual for his cohort. I think this means I win smug MN after all.

If you look at the information Mumsnet provide to people they sell advertising to, they know who their users are and they are more middle class than the average person. This doesn’t mean that there are no WC people on the site, just that there are fewer than in the general population.
Buying clothes secondhand is a middle class marker anyway, and the middle classes have been shopping at aldi and lidl for a long time. I wouldn’t have thought that an SUV was very MC either.

@BoleynMemories13 , I pp about that.

I have an unusual name but when I worked for one company, I was getting mixed up with the other Eman, and I think it was because I was just Eman, unlike the Sarahs and the like who would always be Sarah Surname.

@NattyTurtle59 , that's not true. Do you have any idea how snobbish you sound?

There is a large proportion of the MN population whose sole purpose in life appears to be as contrary as possible, and if you told them something was black they would argue that it was white. So if a name is popular - i.e. meaning that a lot of people like it - then they have to say it's awful, just for the sake of it. As a pp said, they also like to think they are 'superior' to the rest of us.

Having a really popular name is a lifelong pain in the backside. I'm always being muddled up for others.

I think it is quite a big deal, though. My name was number 4 when I was born. I was one of 8 in my school class, and life continued like that, really. I’ve always had to use the first couple of letters of my surname; or been “little XXX” or “blonde XXX”, etc.

It’s rubbish. It’s rubbish always being one of many.

I named my children less common names. I didn’t totally dismiss the top 100 but anything above the top 20 made me a bit wary. They’ve got names that are strong and suit them, and they’re not made up or unheard of, but they’ll hopefully only risk one other child with the same name in their class, if they’re unlucky enough to not be the only one.

I’m so confused when people say MN is middle class. All I see is the majority only buying clothes second hand, shopping at Lidl or Aldi, balking at shopping at Waitrose and hating on SUVs. Lots of advice about what benefits people are entitled to and everyone seems to have not gone abroad for the past 6 years because they can’t afford to

My pet hate phrase on here, which people use so often to warn others off picking a statistically popular name is "he/she will likely be one of 3/4/5 (etc) in their class" 🙄

People remember all the kids called Sarah, Laura, Amy etc when they were at school, and assume it's the same now. It's really not. People choose from a much wider pool of names these days, with so many going out of their way to be different. The days of 3 in a class are all but gone. Of course, you'll always have someone pipe up with "well actually there are 5 kids called Noah in my son's class so it does happen". How true these claims are, only those people genuinely know, but even if it is true those stories are very few and far between in 'real life' (basically, don't believe everything you read on the internet).

Olivia was the number 1 girls name in England and Wales in 2023 with less than 3,000 registrations. That number would have barely got it in the top 20 in the 90s. Chloe was getting nearly 10,000 registrations per year back then!

According to Google, there are nearly 18,000 primary schools in England and Wales. Yet mumsnet will have you believe that all 2906 babies called Olivia in England and Wales in 2023 will go to the same one 🙄. In reality, they have more chance of being the only one in their year (maybe even in the school) than they have of being one of many in the class.

It does tend to suggest a lack of imagination.

I can’t believe people are still using Olivia in 2025. Lovely name but it’s been absolutely done to death.

There is a difference between using a name that has always been well used eg Charlotte, Thomas and using names that appear from nowhere, often celebrity driven eg Sienna, Mila

Because there are a disproportionate amount of snobs on MN.

Surely the whole point of having a name is that it is an identifier? So why would you chose one that could mean when your child is at school or work they end up being Ava S, because there are 4 other Ava’s already.
I think if you love a name and it’s super popular that’s obviously fine and your choice to use it anyway, but there are so many names out there why choose from the top 5.
Lots of people also choose from the top 10 names and then seem baffled when their child is not the only one with name at school/clubs etc.

My DS is a Jude and we only knew of one much older (and male so not short for Judith) when we chose it

I wouldn’t choose a very popular name because I have a very dull name that was so popular in the 50s and 60s that I once worked in a team of 20 where five of us had the same name. I’d never put a child through that.

Our office has a wide range of names and nobody has difficulty pronouncing them.

@Fagli , mine too, but the pronunciations people think are correct vary a lot.
Some of the names are pretty much unpronounceable if you don't speak the language.
Examples, Gerda, Tzah, Ahmetovic, Eleni, Aliczia, Olena

Sorry, meant to clear quote.
Eleni is the odd one out because it should be easy but it gets said in several ways.
The others, I've been corrected when I tried to say the name properly, always by an English monoglot.