Meaning not yet researched.
Canaan: US boys given the name each year, 1880 to 2025, from Social Security card applications. 212 in 2025. Its best rank was #671 in 2016.
US births per year · SSA card applications
Peaked at #671 in 2016; #1,044 in 2025. About 97% of babies named Canaan in 2025 were boys.
Baby name · US data 1880–2025
#1,044 for US boys in 2025. Its best year was 2016, at #671.
Hover, tap or use the arrow keys for any year. Years with fewer than five babies of a sex are not published by SSA and show as zero.
Canaan: US boys given the name each year from 1880 to 2025. 212 boys in 2025. Peak: #671 in 2016 · most boys in one year: 385 (2016).
In 2025, 212 US boys were named Canaan, making it the 1,044th most common boys’ name of the year, up 38 places from #1,082 in 2024. That is 11 more than the 201 boys named Canaan in 2024. Its best rank for boys was #671, reached in 2016. That year also had the most boys given the name: 385. For comparison, it was #806 in 2015 and unranked in 1950.
Social Security card records list Canaan in 53 years of the 146 from 1880 to 2025, starting in 1973 with 6 babies. In all, 6,167 US babies have been given the name, 5.3% of them girls and 95% boys. Its busiest decade was the 2010s, with 2,449 babies named Canaan.
Over the 10 years from 2016 to 2025, 2,544 US boys were named Canaan; the busiest of those years was 2016, with 385. In 2025 that was about 1 in 8,057 of the boys in SSA’s list for the year.
Among the states, Canaan ranked highest in Kentucky in 2025, at #457 for boys there. It was not in the top 100 of any state. Related spellings in the SSA files include Cannon (11,207 babies since 1880), Canyon (4,086 babies since 1880), Canon (2,792 babies since 1880) and Kanan (1,820 babies since 1880). Rarer spellings such as Cainaan and Kainaan are summarised on this page.
Meaning not yet researched.
We publish a meaning only with a cited source and a confidence label, and never generate one. Meanings are being researched for the most common names first.
Rare spellings summarised here: Cainaan (17), Kainaan (6).
Numbers are all-time US births. Links come from Wikidata’s “said to be the same as” (P460, CC0) and our spelling rule: at most two letters different, with the same sound pattern.
No nicknames listed for Canaan in the open dataset we use.
Source: carltonnorthern/nicknames (Apache-2.0).
US boys. Rank within each state. SSA leaves out states where fewer than five boys got the name, so 33 are not listed.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank 2025 | Rank 2015 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kentucky | 10 | #457 | — |
| North Carolina | 19 | #515 | #772 |
| Virginia | 11 | #638 | #547 |
| Tennessee | 11 | #643 | #459 |
| Louisiana | 6 | #680 | #545 |
| Georgia | 14 | #680 | #476 |
| Alabama | 6 | #692 | #344 |
| Oklahoma | 5 | #717 | #327 |
| Maryland | 6 | #723 | — |
| Missouri | 7 | #727 | #616 |
| South Carolina | 5 | #761 | — |
| Ohio | 9 | #868 | #515 |
| Indiana | 6 | #869 | #673 |
| Illinois | 8 | #948 | #1,089 |
| Florida | 13 | #1,019 | #1,038 |
| Pennsylvania | 7 | #1,019 | #710 |
| California | 13 | #1,369 | #1,464 |
| Texas | 13 | #1,424 | #946 |
Births and national rank for each year SSA lists the name, newest first.
| Year | Girls | Girls rank | Boys | Boys rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 6 | #13,520 | 212 | #1,044 |
| 2024 | — | — | 201 | #1,082 |
| 2023 | 10 | #9,751 | 190 | #1,112 |
| 2022 | 5 | #15,759 | 236 | #960 |
| 2021 | 7 | #12,463 | 236 | #954 |
| 2020 | — | — | 231 | #950 |
| 2019 | 9 | #10,637 | 265 | #846 |
| 2018 | 16 | #7,169 | 270 | #828 |
| 2017 | 7 | #12,982 | 318 | #745 |
| 2016 | — | — | 385 | #671 |
| 2015 | 13 | #8,556 | 285 | #806 |
| 2014 | 12 | #9,093 | 180 | #1,074 |
| 2013 | 7 | #13,446 | 149 | #1,205 |
| 2012 | 14 | #8,301 | 172 | #1,085 |
| 2011 | 6 | #15,198 | 159 | #1,137 |
| 2010 | 19 | #6,701 | 163 | #1,139 |
| 2009 | 16 | #7,750 | 146 | #1,228 |
| 2008 | 11 | #10,216 | 150 | #1,182 |
| 2007 | 7 | #14,200 | 137 | #1,278 |
| 2006 | 9 | #11,621 | 161 | #1,092 |
| 2005 | 5 | #16,968 | 126 | #1,253 |
| 2004 | 8 | #11,814 | 118 | #1,273 |
| 2003 | 14 | #7,663 | 119 | #1,224 |
| 2002 | 9 | #10,388 | 99 | #1,333 |
| 2001 | 10 | #9,496 | 108 | #1,231 |
| 2000 | 9 | #10,042 | 93 | #1,362 |
| 1999 | 13 | #7,313 | 79 | #1,459 |
| 1998 | 13 | #7,179 | 91 | #1,302 |
| 1997 | 6 | #12,336 | 87 | #1,311 |
| 1996 | 7 | #10,762 | 75 | #1,401 |
| 1995 | 8 | #9,710 | 52 | #1,710 |
| 1994 | 8 | #9,712 | 54 | #1,670 |
| 1993 | 9 | #8,835 | 58 | #1,558 |
| 1992 | 10 | #8,173 | 44 | #1,848 |
| 1991 | — | — | 43 | #1,830 |
| 1990 | — | — | 52 | #1,590 |
| 1989 | 6 | #11,041 | 26 | #2,486 |
| 1988 | 5 | #12,078 | 22 | #2,617 |
| 1987 | 5 | #11,543 | 27 | #2,174 |
| 1986 | — | — | 15 | #3,153 |
| 1985 | — | — | 16 | #2,960 |
| 1984 | — | — | 25 | #2,106 |
| 1983 | — | — | 34 | #1,688 |
| 1982 | — | — | 16 | #2,853 |
| 1981 | — | — | 21 | #2,352 |
| 1980 | 5 | #10,587 | 15 | #2,980 |
| 1979 | — | — | 14 | #3,028 |
| 1978 | — | — | 10 | #3,638 |
| 1977 | — | — | 19 | #2,376 |
| 1976 | — | — | 11 | #3,295 |
| 1975 | — | — | 10 | #3,468 |
| 1974 | — | — | 12 | #2,973 |
| 1973 | — | — | 6 | #4,573 |
About the data: counts are Social Security card applications for US births, for names given to at least five babies of a sex in a year (SSA, names.zip, public domain). Ranks follow SSA’s own order: most births first, ties alphabetical. Files retrieved 2026-10-05 (checksum on our sources page).