Freddie, not Frederick: the nicknames on Britain’s birth certificates

Freddie was the tenth most popular boys' name in England and Wales in 2025, given to 2,526 boys. Frederick went to 954. Add Archie at 11th, Alfie at 16th, Albie at 21st, Charlie at 22nd and the rest, and 26,173 boys were registered under a pet name last year. That is one boy in ten.

In America it is one boy in 134. But America has been here before. In 1947 one American boy in eleven was a Larry, a Jerry, a Billy or a Bobby, and in 1881 one American girl in six was a Minnie, an Annie or a Nellie. The nickname on the birth certificate is not a British invention. It is an American habit that America dropped.

How we counted

A pet name, for this article, is a name that ends in an “ee” sound and is the familiar form of another name that is also in use. Most are the long name cut down with the ending added: Alfie from Alfred, Lottie from Charlotte. A few are changed at the front as well, and we count those too: Billy, Bobby, Teddy, Molly, Peggy, Nancy. Harry is in the count as the old pet form of Henry; most British parents would not call it a nickname, so we give the figure without it as well. Short forms with no ending are out: Theo, 12th here with 2,398 boys, is not counted, and nor are Joe, Fred, Max or Jack. Names that end in -ie or -y but are nobody's nickname are out too: Henry, Lily, Poppy, Rory, Sophie. The list was drawn up by hand, 86 boys' names and 126 girls', and every one of them is in this page's notes with the full name we matched it to. Boys and girls are counted from their own lists in the official files, never from our own gender label.

The American counts are from 2017, the newest full count we hold, and the American rankings run to 2025. The long American series, 1880 to 2008, covers the top 1,000 names each year, so every figure from it is a floor.

One boy in ten, one girl in fourteen

The Office for National Statistics counted 273,652 boys born in England and Wales in 2025. 26,173 of them, 9.6%, got a pet name. Leave Harry out and it is 24,455, one in eleven. Fifteen of the top 100 boys' names are pet names: Freddie, Archie, Alfie, Harry, Albie, Charlie, Louie 28th, Teddy 34th, Reggie 37th, Ronnie 39th, Tommy 44th, Frankie 56th, Vinnie 58th, Toby 89th and Bobby 94th. Thirty seven pet names went to 50 or more boys.

Girls do it less. 17,596 of 253,281 girls, 6.9%, one in fourteen. Elsie is 8th with 1,700 girls, then Rosie 24th, Lottie 31st, Evie 35th, Millie 36th and Maisie 43rd; nine pet names in the top 100 and 47 with 50 or more girls. The 2024 file gives the same shares, 9.6% of boys and 6.9% of girls, so this is not one odd year.

The striking part is how often the pet name has beaten the full name it came from. Of the 37 boys' pet names with 50 or more babies, 17 outnumber their full name, and some of the margins are enormous. Ronnie 1,281, Ronald 59. Archie 2,465, Archibald 123. Reggie 1,312, Reginald 217. Charlie 1,679, Charles 437. Alfie 1,955, Alfred 682. Albie 1,702, Albert 884. Freddie 2,526, Frederick 954. Among the girls, 17 of 47: Elsie 1,700 against Elizabeth 624; Rosie 1,343 against Rose 666; Maisie 966 against Margaret 98; Nancy 604 against Ann and Anne, 44 between them.

It is not universal. Teddy, 1,360, is a quarter of Teddy plus Theodore (2,638, 9th) plus Edward (1,385). Lottie and Charlotte are level, 1,222 and 1,339. Tilly is 264 to Matilda's 1,449, Ollie 412 to Oliver's 3,154. The names where the full form still wins are mostly the ones where the full form is itself in the top 30.

America writes the full name

13,718 American boys got a pet name in 2017, out of 1,834,490. One in 134, about a thirteenth of the British rate. The biggest is Charlie, 1,776 boys, which is 20% of Charlie plus Charles; here Charlie is 79%. Then Johnny 964, Andy 875, Danny 572 and Tony 514. The British favourites barely exist. Freddie went to 76 American boys, Reggie to 50, Alfie to 27, Albie to 16, against 580 Fredericks, 263 Reginalds, 250 Alfreds and 714 Alberts. Only two boys' pet names outnumber their full name in America: Archie, 156 to 49, and Rudy, 246 to 40.

American girls are different, and this is the one place the two countries meet. 36,086 American girls got a pet name in 2017, one in 47, not far off Britain's one in 14 once you allow for the boys' gap. But they are different pet names. Ellie went to 4,993 American girls and Sadie to 3,695, and each is about half of the pair: Ellie 47% of Ellie plus Eleanor, Sadie 48% of Sadie plus Sarah. In England and Wales Ellie is 35% and Sadie 50%. Then Molly 1,819, Gracie 1,586 and Josie 1,524. Elsie, Britain's number one pet name, went to 1,077 American girls against 8,915 Elizabeths.

When America did it

The long American series starts in 1880, and in 1880 one American girl in six had a pet name on the record. Minnie was the fifth most popular girls' name in the country, 1.8% of all girls. Annie was 11th, Nellie 18th, Carrie 20th, Bessie 23rd, and 68 of the top 1,000 girls' names were pet names. 1881 is the record year, 16.4%. Boys were at one in 26, led by Harry, 8th in 1889, Charlie and Willie.

The girls' share fell steadily to one in sixteen by 1917, and then Betty arrived. Betty was the second most popular girls' name in America every year from 1928 to 1934, and in 1930 one girl in 30 was a Betty. Nancy followed, 7th in 1947 and 1948, with Judy 11th in 1946. A second wave came in the 1950s, Kathy, Debbie, Cindy, Lori, and in 1958 one American girl in eight had a pet name again. Tammy was 8th in 1968. Then it stopped. One in 15 by 1970, one in 26 by 1980, one in 50 by 1990, one in 72 by 2008.

The boys' wave was the 1940s. For most of the years to 1928 the biggest boys' pet name was Harry, with Willie in front from 1905 to 1910, when it was 11th in the country. From 1929 it was Billy (20th in 1934), with Bobby (24th in 1936) behind it, then Jerry, and from 1937 Larry, which was the tenth most popular boys' name in America in 1947. That year one American boy in eleven had a pet name: Larry, Jerry 20th, Terry 26th, Danny 39th, Willie, Jimmy, Johnny, Billy. 58 of the top 1,000 boys' names were pet names. The 1950s added Randy, Ricky and Tony and held the share at about one in 12. After 1958 it fell in every year but two: one in 22 by 1970, one in 34 by 1980, one in 58 by 1990, one in 122 by 2008, when the biggest pet name for American boys was Andy at 211th.

The full American files, which count every name given to five or more babies, pick the story up where the series ends. Boys: one in 53 in 1990, one in 85 in 2000, one in 105 in 2010, one in 134 in 2017. Girls: one in 42 in 1990, one in 54 in 2000, one in 53 in 2010, one in 47 in 2017. So the girls' share has been flat for thirty years while the names underneath changed completely. In 1990 the American pet names were Katie (6,505 girls), Molly, Nancy, Carrie, Cindy and Jenny. In 2017 they were Ellie, Sadie, Molly, Gracie and Josie.

Britain's pet names are crossing over

The American rankings run to 2025, and the girls' list is where Britain's names are arriving. Millie was 469th for American girls in 2015 and is 73rd. Josie went from 250th to 82nd, Elsie from 386th to 123rd, Maisie from 625th to 233rd, Evie from 511th to 270th, Rosie from 774th to 283rd. Lottie, Winnie, Nellie and Tilly were outside the American top 1,000 in 2015 and are inside it now. Four pet names are in America's girls' top 100 in 2025, Ellie 24th, Sadie 50th, Millie and Josie; in 2015 it was Ellie and Sadie alone.

The boys are going the other way. Nine boys' pet names dropped out of the American top 1,000 between 2015 and 2025, and they are the 1940s names: Willie, Billy, Bobby, Ronnie, Larry, Terry, Randy and Kenny among them. Three came in, Archie at 301st, Teddy at 823rd and Benny. Charlie climbed from 231st to 145th and Louie from 962nd to 596th. No boys' pet name is in the American top 100, and none was in 2015. The full names, meanwhile, are near the top: Theodore 4th, Henry 5th, Charles 48th.

What we cannot tell you

Why. The files say what parents wrote on the form, not why they wrote it, and we will not guess. Nor can we say whether Britain has always registered pet names or started recently: we hold two years of the ONS file, 2024 and 2025, and they agree with each other. And the list is a judgement. Another list would move the figure a little; it would not move one boy in ten anywhere near one in 134.

What it means for you

If you are in Britain and torn between Alfie and Alfred, the data says you are in the majority either way: nearly three Alfies are born here for every Alfred, and the Alfred will be the one who stands out. If you are in America the same choice puts you with one family in ten. And if what you want is a name that works in both countries, the girls' pet names travel and the boys' do not. Ellie, Sadie, Millie and Josie are top-100 names on both sides of the Atlantic. Freddie, Alfie and Albie, three of Britain's top 25, went to 119 American boys between them.