Ernest
Boy nameErnest has been given to 304,354 babies in the U.S. since 1880. It peaked in 1921.
Meaning & origin /ˈɜː(ɹ)nɪst/
Borrowed in the 18th century from Ernst, a medieval royal name in Germany, from Old High German ernust (“vigor, strife”), only remotely related to modern German ernst or English earnest.
Origin: Germanic languages
Etymology adapted from Wiktionary, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Popularity over time births per year, 1880–2025
Total babies
304,354
Peak year
1921 (5,723 babies)
Rank in 2025
Below top 1000
First recorded
1880
10-year trend
▼ -1%
Gender split
1% girls / 99% boys
Famous people named Ernest
Ernest Hemingway
American author and journalist (1899–1961)
Ernest Rutherford
New Zealand physicist (1871–1937)
Ernest Lawrence
American nuclear physicist (1901–1958)
Ernest Walton
Irish physicist and Nobel laureate (1903-1995)
Notability data from Wikidata (CC0).
Names with a similar vibe
Same primary gender, peaked around the same years, and roughly as common as Ernest.
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