Top 50 California Baby Names

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Written by Elizabeth Weiss McGolerick

The list of top California baby names for girls and boys has got it all, from unique names to trendy names and even the exotic name. We aren't surprised - after all, California is the home of Hollywood celebrities, and their sometimes kooky but always cool baby naming methods. What are the baby name trends statewide? Are they influenced by the whims of the stars?

Vamp-demonium

The Twilight saga has influenced popular culture in any number of ways – and, not surprisingly, the books have reached into the baby name category as well, with couples now immortalizing the main characters by passing their names onto their babies.

The last time Edward saw the top 100 nationwide was in 1997, but the boy’s name that has held the top spot in the U.S. for 10 years – Jacob, Twilight’s resident shape shifter and werewolf – comes in at number four in California. Isabella – which was helped to the number one girl’s spot in 2009, no doubt, by Twilight’s Isabella Swan – is also the number one girl’s name in California.

Perhaps the coolness of Edward Cullen will soon rub off on this “archaic” name and launch it into a hot spot in the near future.

Exotic Names

Scattered throughout the top 25 names of both boys and girls in California are titles influenced by Mexican and Spanish heritage.

Found on the boys’ list are Angel, Jose, Adrian, Julian and Diego.

On the girls’ list are Isabella, Sophia, Mia, Valeria, Sofia and Camila.

Nationwide Comparisons

So just how trendy are California parents? You could say they definitely help add to the nationwide trends, giving their newborns almost every name that makes the top-10 lists for girls and boys in the nation. Check out the complete list of Top 100 baby names from the Social Security Administration to compare.

The following boys’ names appear on the top 25 list in California and in the top-10 nationwide:

Daniel (CA-1, USA-7)
Anthony (CA-2, USA-10)
Jacob (CA-4, USA-1)
Alexander (CA-5, USA-4)
Ethan (CA-6, USA-2)
Joshua (CA-10, USA-6)
Michael (CA-13, USA-3)
Jayden (CA-14, USA-8)
Noah (CA-19, USA-9)

The only boy name that’s in the nationwide top 10 but not in the California top 25 is William.

As for girls, the following names appear on the top 25 list in California and in the top-10 nationwide: Isabella (CA-1, USA-1)

Sophia (CA-2, USA-4)
Emily (CA-3, USA-6)
Mia (CA-4, USA-10)
Emma (CA-7, USA-2)
Abigail (CA-9, USA-8)
Olivia (CA-10, USA-3)
Ava (CA-11, USA-5)
Chloe (CA-12, USA-9)
Madison (CA-16, USA-7)

All the girl names in the nationwide top10 appear on the California top 25.

New Additions and Who’s Missing

There are some surprising names that appear on the lists of top baby names in California. Evelyn – once thought of as a rather old-fashioned name – just made the cut at number 25 in the state. Its national ranking in 2009 was 39. Likewise, for boys, Brandon came in at number 25 in California but only at number 38 in the nation.

Surprisingly absent from the list of girl names was Addison, which has been creeping up the list of most popular names nationwide in the past several years, just hovering outside of the top 10 in recent years. Hannah, once an incredibly popular name at the top of the pack in the early 2000s is now 23 nationwide and does not appear as a favorite in California at all.

Below are the top 50 names in the state of California in 2009.