To wonder why you would pick a name in the top 10?

[FreckledFrog]

So the latest top 100 baby names have been released this week. It has prompted me to wonder why on earth you would pick a name in the top 10-20 names.

There are thousands of beautiful, unique names out there, yet so many people are happy to pick the same names despite knowing their children will go to school with multiple Olivia's, Noah's, Amelia's or George's.

Do these people not desire some originality for their children?

Am I being unreasonable? I have a very very unusual name and have picked less common names for my children and I wonder if this clouds my judgement?

You don't understand why people would pick a name in the top 10-20 as they will all end up being the same, but this celebrity trend to pick an 'unusual' or made up name is copying a trend and following others just as much! Makes me laugh when people I know think they are being original, but it's just what's in fashion at the moment. Some ridiculous names going around the now.

My son has a popular name but I've loved it for years and it's a classic. He is the only one with that name to me.

I'm a fan of generic names. I have Boy1 and Boy2. Weirdly, though, I've never come across either name anywhere else...

My DD with her top 10 name is in a teeny school. There's only ever been 1 other with her name in the 9 forms she's been there.

There is however a little boy with what would be classed as an unusual name. There's two in his class

My daughter has a very popular name, haven’t checked recently but must be in top 20. The name I preferred, and DH didn’t like, is outside the top 500.

Guess what? She’s the only one with her name in the school. Had we gone with my preferred name she’d be one of two in her class. There are no guarantees with any of them.

I have a VERY popular name from my era... I never considered resenting it or wanting to be more unique.it is easy to spell and to explain and it's how I identify myself.
My husband has an unusual but well known name iyswim and resents his mother for her vanity in picking it. He would have preferred to be John / Richard/ Tom etc . He is an extrovert, successful leader type ...think of your child when you are choosing.

If you take MIa as an example- the number 10 girls's name- you'd have meet 113 baby girls before you met another one.

"I'm a fan of generic names. I have Boy1 and Boy2. Weirdly, though, I've never come across either name anywhere else..."

We genuinely call ours Girl and Boy as pet names....

I picked my kids names because I liked them, I have to live with them, and I am confident that their personalities will make them identifiable against the many people they are likely to meet in the course of their lives.

I honestly don't get your issue? People are not picked for top jobs by the popularity of their names, teachers don't think 'hmm, Myles, he's the only one in my class with that name so I'll choose him instead of one of the Alex's.

My boys names are not in the top 10 but they were, or were close to it when they were born. I think you're being ridiculous especially with your claiming to be 'baffled'.

We picked what we thought was a fairly unusual name for DS, then there were three of them in his North London nursery class! Couldn't believe it. Moved out of London a few years later and he is now the only one in his school with that name.

I like John

We picked a name that's very high up on the boys list. I would of picked it regardless of its position. Why do you feel the need to judge others on name choices? Pretty sad.

I picked really common names. I like the names, they are easy to spell and pronounce, are the names of older family members we love, they won't make people draw any conclusions about them initially (other than that they have boring parents perhaps!). I don't think all people called the same name are the same. My children are unique, and will be able to do many original things if they choose to, without having an unusual name to prove it.

I do know a couple of people who didn't use their favourite name because they thought it would be too popular, and feel a bit regretful about going for their second choice when it transpires there isn't one in their class after all. So it can go both ways. You can actually go quite a long way never meeting anyone with one of the top ten names - being "most popular" doesn't necessarily mean it's everywhere you look. Something has to top the list.

I don't mind having the initial after to help to identify, why is that a problem?

My DD was born pre internet so you had no idea how popular a name was. When she went to school she was one of three in her class. My boys have never been in a school with someone with the same name. Neither are particularly out there

Right, in 2016, there were 5000 babies named Olivia in the UK, from approx. 340 k babies.

So, a frequency of 0,0147 in the population.

The chance of having any two random baby girls both called Olivia is 2 in 10 000.

If your child is named Olivia, the chance of another Olivia in the same class of 20 children is 28%, so, more than 1:4.

But the chance of having two Olivias in the same class, in general, is 4%, so, 1:25.

I think. Or at least approximately.

The problem is not so much that the names are in the top 10, but how many people have the top names. If Olivia was as in the US, also 5000 (more or less), but in 1 million, then the probabilities decrease significantly.

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/livebirths/bulletins/babynamesenglandandwales/2016

DS1 has a biblical name. I agreed to it (DH's choice) because I had never taught a child with that name and had no prejudices. That year his name was 5th most popular. DD is named after my grandmother, that years her name was 6th most popular. I don't regret either of their names, and neither do they. DS2 also has a biblical name, but his name has never been particularly popular, just a classic name.
I did consider Thomas for DS2 though, and he would have been the 4th Thomas in his class, but I wouldn't have predicted that either.

Wondering how many of you are called Natasha or variations of it?

People just don't realise that they are having the same influences on what they think sounds like a nice name to everyone else!

It astounds me that people choose top 10 names now saying they are 'classic' as if they have always been popular when there is no overlap at all with the 1984 (possible year of parents birth on average) top 10.

There are very few names that are truely classic, i.e. endure through the centuries, Catherine and James spring to mind.

Olivia and Oliver are trendy not classic!

I suppose 1984 parents thought Sarah and Christopher were classic.

Now they are dated, in a way Catherine and James aren't.

Also the name list isn't a good indicator of the '2 in the class test'.

Look at the top 100 list closely: names that are listed separately actually sound the same out loud or have the same nicknames

E.g.
Sophia/Sofia
Lily/Lilly
Darcey/Darcie
Amelia/Emilia/Millie/Amelie
Eleanor/Ellie
Ava/Eva/Evie/Evelyn
Elizabeth/Eliza
Charlotte/Lottie
Sara/Sarah
Grace/Gracie
Isabella/Isabelle/Bella/Ella/Arabella
Annabelle/Anna

Or the still quite similar
Leah/Lola/Layla/Luna

All of the above are just the variants in the top 100. Lots of these names have further variants and often have hyphenated names so the raw list grossly underestimates the prevalence of names sounds in class.

There are thousands of names that are easy to spell, not made up and not uber trendy.

It's lazy not to give some serious consideration to the importance of baby naming.

In 10 yrs time the internet will have taken over to a greater extent than now even. People will be so happy to be called Olivia Jones so they can go incognito online! Plus Olivia Jones is a lovely name. People with unique spellings or unusual double barrelling will be instantly searchable. I know someone whose name is the only spelling of it (ever). Google only the first name and you find the person! Compared to googling "Sarah"

What, it's lazy to use a beautiful biblical name like Eve or Sarah, or names that sound like it? Used for thousands of years, but not unique enough for the current generation, huh?

"tealdeal" - I don't really understand why you get to decide what's truly classic. My great grandmothers were named Sarah and Catherine, as it happens, and I know two young children named Sarah and know of none named Catherine, though it was on my own list. And as for your "lazy..." etc generalisation. That'd be true if any actual harm could be attributed to having a top ten name when actually the opposite is generally the case.

18 years later, Isabella and Isabelle have zoomed up to 7th and 8th respectively and the old English spelling Isobel has dropped out of the top 100...
I'm not sure why the continental spellings have gained in relative popularly.

I hate to say it, but I'd bet my left arm the movie Twilight had something to do with this. Noted a surge of teenage girls at that time remarking on how beautiful the name Bella was, wished they had it, etc.

It's lazy not to give some serious consideration to the importance of baby naming.

True, but my "consideration" had nothing to do with whether some other child might possibly have the same name and more to do with my family history, whether I liked the name combinations, how it sounded with my surname and a whole host of other reasons!