Most popular names 2020: Ben and Emma have fallen from the throne – Panorama

In the ranking of name expert Knud Bielefeld, Ben is no longer the most popular name among newborn boys in Germany. After nine years at the helm, Noah fired him, but by a narrow margin, as statistics published by the amateur researcher on Wednesday in Ahrensburg (Schleswig-Holstein) and available to the German press agency show. Matteo is also very close to Noah and Ben. It was similarly close with the girls, Bielefeld told dpa. There, Mia, Emilia and Hannah pushed the popular Emma from her throne.

“That was very exciting for me. It was a head-to-head race until the last second. In most of the previous years I already knew in the spring who would be number one because the main names had already built a big gap during the year.” . . “This means that the ranking is not as significant this year, said Bielefeld, who evaluated the names of about 23 percent of all children born in Germany in 2020.” If my sample had looked a little different, then the name , which is now perhaps in second or third place, would be in first place. There are only minor differences between them. “

However, the change at the top was already predictable. Because both Emilia and Matteo have steadily climbed up the hottest names list in recent years. “If I have to predict: I expect Matteo and Emilia to be number one next year if the uptrend continues like this.”

By the way, Emma, ​​Sophia, Lina, Ella, Mila, Clara and Lea landed in the other places with the girls. Finn, Leon, Elias, Paul, Henry, Luis and Felix made the top ten for boys. The most popular middle names in 2020 were Sophia, Marie, and Maria, as well as Alexander, Elias, and Maximilian.

Open detailed view

International names, especially in English and Scandinavian, as well as older German names are also popular every year, according to the naming expert. “Emil, Anton, Paul, Emma, ​​Anna – these are older names that we have known for a long time. Gerda rises higher from year to year and the name Kurt has become more and more popular, especially in Saxony.” Bielefeld couldn’t say why that could be.

Clear descent: Greta

According to Bielefeld, there is also a clear decline this year: the first name Greta. Back in the summer, he had predicted that the first name, also carried by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg, would slide down the list of popular names. Now it has even dropped from 30th to 130th. “It really is the most remarkable observation I have made since these statistics. Such a steep drop.” Of course, parents have given their children extraordinary names again in 2020. For example, the girls were named Amore, Divora, and Marvelous, while the boys were named Archibald, Hotte, Rhett, and Denver. According to Bielefeld, all these names were given at least twice in Germany. On the other hand, a name did not appear: Corona.

The year of the exception to the coronavirus was still noted in the evaluation of the list of results of first names. Usually, Bielefeld and his assistants evaluate both the official reports of a city and the photo galleries of maternity clinics. However, due to the crown, photographers were there less frequently in 2020. Instead, this year significantly more registry offices gave him data on the names, the expert reported.

For statistics, Bielefeld evaluated data from 465 locations. They correspond to about 23 percent of all children born in 2020. The Society for German Language also publishes similar statistics with about 90 percent of all data from registry offices. In a forecast in mid-December, he saw Emil and Lena with the best chances for the top spots nationally.