NameYear

Girls' name · peaked in 1998

Precious name popularity since 1925

19,241 babies born in the US from 1925 to 2025 were named Precious (99.3% girls, 0.7% boys). Half of them were born in 1996 or earlier, so the typical Precious is about 30 years old in 2026. Precious peaked in 1998 as the #381 name for girls, and it was outside the top 1,000 in 2025.

US babies since 1925
19,241
Named Precious, 1925–2025
Peak year
1998
#381 for girls that year
Typical age
About 30
Median birth year 1996
In 2025
Not top 1,000
#3,158 for girls in 2025
Girls / boys
99.3% girls
19,115 girls · 126 boys
Most popular in
Louisiana
2.52× its national share

Peak year is the year Precious made up the largest share of US girls, in records going back to 1880. Typical age is based on births from 1925 on, not on who is living today.

Precious births per year, 1925–2025

Babies named Precious per year, 1925–2025

The biggest year by count was 2001. Measured as a share of all babies, Precious peaked in 1998.

  • Fastest rise: Between 1975 and 1980, Precious became 2.1× more common, from 1 in 13,800 baby girls to 1 in 6,670.
  • Steepest fall: Between 2007 and 2012, its share of baby girls fell by 66%, from 1 in 3,840 to 1 in 11,200.

Shaded on the chart. Both compare Precious's share of all US girls five years apart, counting only years with at least 100 babies named Precious.

Decade by decade

Babies named Precious in each decade, and its rank among girls' names in the middle year of the decade (1935, 1945 … 2025).

Decade GirlsBoys Rank
1925–29 10921 –
1930s 1380 #3,112
1940s 1680 #2,426
1950s 1650 #2,698
1960s 3260 #1,906
1970s 1,0206 #1,107
1980s 3,55534 #530
1990s 6,30515 #415
2000s 5,45422 #544
2010s 1,45622 #1,640
2020–25 4196 #3,158

Ranks count every name given to at least 5 girls that year, so they can go past 1,000.

Generation fingerprint

42.4% of babies named Precious from 1925 to 2025 were born in the Gen Z years (1997–2012). The full split by generation:

Precious by generation Greatest Generation born 1925–27 0.5% Silent Generation born 1928–45 1.4% Baby Boomers born 1946–64 1.9% Gen X born 1965–80 7.7% Millennials born 1981–96 39.4% Gen Z born 1997–2012 42.4% Gen Alpha born 2013–25 6.6%

Where Precious is most popular

The index compares Precious's share of babies in each state with its share nationwide, 1925–2025 (1.50× = 50% more common). States with at least 300 babies named Precious.

StateIndexBabies
Louisiana2.52×739
Mississippi2.30×454
Florida2.06×1,214
Georgia1.95×879
South Carolina1.64×375

Names with a similar story

Of the other 1999 names on this site, these six had the share of babies closest in shape to Precious's from 1925 to 2025, however common each one got. Each line is scaled to its own high; the dashed line is Precious.

Names from the same era

Other common names that peaked within two years of Precious (1998).

Source: U.S. Social Security Administration national and state baby-name data, which covers names given to at least 5 babies of one sex in a year. About the data