What are the commonest baby names in your borough?
Every year, the Office for National Statistics releases data on the commonest baby names registered in the past year. It recently shared the 2023 data. As usual, the London stats are broken down by borough, allowing us to make the graphic above.
Commonest boys' names in London boroughs
The Noahfication of London appears to be on the wane. This year, Noah is the top name in nine London boroughs, down from its peak of 13 last year. The maritime patriarch has lost ground to Muhammed/Mohammed, who now tops the list in 10 boroughs, up from eight last year. These names are also the two most popular across England and Wales as a whole.
We wave goodbye to Hugo (top name in H&F last year), and Chaim (champ of Hackney in 2022), while noting a mini-cluster of Georges in the south-east (Bromley and Bexley). Overall, though, most London boroughs record no change for top boy names from 2022.
Commonest girls' names in London boroughs
Fun fact: in 2022, 29 of the 32 boroughs had a most-popular girls' name that ended with the letter 'a'. This year it's down to 23. This is partly thanks to the name Lily, which comes top in both Haringey and Kingston, but didn't feature at all last year. The other newcomer — not seen before in these charts — is Ayla, the most popular girls' name in Waltham Forest.
Overall, the commonest list-topper this year is Olivia with seven boroughs, with Amelia clocking five. These are also the two most-popular girls' names nationally. Sophia/Sophie/Sofia could also muster seven London boroughs if we were to treat them as variations on one name.
We wave goodbye to Luna, who topped the Lambeth table in 2022; Sara, formerly super-popular in Brent; and Florence, an erstwhile hit in Bexley.
Commonest names London-wide
Interesting though these stats are, they're also based on small data sets. Typically, a 'top' name was only registered a few dozen times in the given borough, and the second-place name may have seen only a registration or two fewer. If we instead sum the data across all the London boroughs, then the stats stack up as follows:
1. Muhammad: 841
2. Noah: 616
3. Leo: 495
4. Adam: 397
5. Oliver: 370
6. Mohammed: 332
7. Theodore: 324
8. Luca: 322
9. George: 303
10. Alexander: 296
These are broadly the same as the 2022 data, with the loss of Arthur (formerly the 7th most popular name) and the introduction of Luca.
In total, 53,320 male births were registered in London in 2023. This is down from 54,870 in 2022 and 56,875 in 2021.
For girls, the top names stack up like this:
1. Amelia: 388
2. Olivia: 381
3. Sofia: 368
4. Maya: 302
5. Sienna: 296
6. Mia: 267
7. Sophia: 264
8. Ava: 260
9. Lily: 260
10. Isla: 239
Again, the top 10 is fairly stable. Only Isabella has dropped out from the 2022 list, replaced by Lily. The top four are all the same.
In total, 50,932 female births were registered in London in 2023. That's a drop on 51,826 (2022) 54,086 (2021).
See previous results for 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018 and 2017
