Meaning not yet researched.
Nicolai: US boys given the name each year, 1880 to 2025, from Social Security card applications. 51 in 2025. Its best rank was #1,883 in 2015.
US births per year · SSA card applications
Peaked at #1,883 in 2015; #2,590 in 2025. Every baby recorded as Nicolai in 2025 was a boy.
Baby name · US data 1880–2025
#2,590 for US boys in 2025. Its best year was 2015, at #1,883.
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.
Nicolai: US boys given the name each year from 1880 to 2025. 51 boys in 2025. Peak: #1,883 in 2015 · most boys in one year: 78 (2015).
In 2025, 51 US boys were named Nicolai, making it the 2,590th most common boys’ name of the year, down 4 places from #2,586 in 2024. That is 1 fewer than the 52 boys named Nicolai in 2024. Its best rank for boys was #1,883, reached in 2015. That year also had the most boys given the name: 78. For comparison, it was #1,883 in 2015 and unranked in 1950.
Social Security card records list Nicolai in 54 years of the 146 from 1880 to 2025, starting in 1962 with 6 babies. In all, 1,865 US babies have been given the name, all of them boys. Its busiest decade was the 2010s, with 607 babies named Nicolai.
Over the 10 years from 2016 to 2025, 554 US boys were named Nicolai; the busiest of those years was 2022, with 69. In 2025 that was about 1 in 33,492 of the boys in SSA’s list for the year.
Among the states, Nicolai ranked highest in Ohio in 2025, at #1,213 for boys there. It was not in the top 100 of any state. Related spellings in the SSA files include Nikolai (11,027 babies since 1880), Nicola (8,090 babies since 1880) and Nikola (4,102 babies since 1880).
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.
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 Nicolai 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 47 are not listed.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank 2025 | Rank 2015 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ohio | 6 | #1,213 | — |
| Florida | 6 | #1,778 | #1,248 |
| California | 7 | #2,141 | #1,357 |
| Texas | 6 | #2,478 | #1,727 |
Births and national rank for each year SSA lists the name, newest first.
| Year | Girls | Girls rank | Boys | Boys rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | — | — | 51 | #2,590 |
| 2024 | — | — | 52 | #2,586 |
| 2023 | — | — | 54 | #2,502 |
| 2022 | — | — | 69 | #2,147 |
| 2021 | — | — | 50 | #2,612 |
| 2020 | — | — | 50 | #2,575 |
| 2019 | — | — | 55 | #2,454 |
| 2018 | — | — | 62 | #2,222 |
| 2017 | — | — | 45 | #2,748 |
| 2016 | — | — | 66 | #2,129 |
| 2015 | — | — | 78 | #1,883 |
| 2014 | — | — | 68 | #2,075 |
| 2013 | — | — | 60 | #2,194 |
| 2012 | — | — | 63 | #2,147 |
| 2011 | — | — | 50 | #2,497 |
| 2010 | — | — | 60 | #2,201 |
| 2009 | — | — | 59 | #2,246 |
| 2008 | — | — | 70 | #2,021 |
| 2007 | — | — | 50 | #2,526 |
| 2006 | — | — | 57 | #2,239 |
| 2005 | — | — | 48 | #2,420 |
| 2004 | — | — | 47 | #2,405 |
| 2003 | — | — | 45 | #2,382 |
| 2002 | — | — | 30 | #3,065 |
| 2001 | — | — | 27 | #3,298 |
| 2000 | — | — | 30 | #2,971 |
| 1999 | — | — | 28 | #2,998 |
| 1998 | — | — | 29 | #2,835 |
| 1997 | — | — | 30 | #2,662 |
| 1996 | — | — | 23 | #3,176 |
| 1995 | — | — | 41 | #2,048 |
| 1994 | — | — | 32 | #2,432 |
| 1993 | — | — | 20 | #3,331 |
| 1992 | — | — | 23 | #2,973 |
| 1991 | — | — | 22 | #2,963 |
| 1990 | — | — | 36 | #2,070 |
| 1989 | — | — | 26 | #2,525 |
| 1988 | — | — | 14 | #3,650 |
| 1987 | — | — | 9 | #4,844 |
| 1986 | — | — | 16 | #3,089 |
| 1985 | — | — | 10 | #4,253 |
| 1984 | — | — | 11 | #3,858 |
| 1983 | — | — | 15 | #3,025 |
| 1982 | — | — | 5 | #7,057 |
| 1981 | — | — | 11 | #3,784 |
| 1980 | — | — | 8 | #4,818 |
| 1979 | — | — | 7 | #5,205 |
| 1978 | — | — | 6 | #5,563 |
| 1977 | — | — | 7 | #4,956 |
| 1976 | — | — | 13 | #3,047 |
| 1975 | — | — | 10 | #3,599 |
| 1974 | — | — | 5 | #5,764 |
| 1969 | — | — | 6 | #4,271 |
| 1962 | — | — | 6 | #3,908 |
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).