Jack and Emily are Scotland’s top baby names

Jack and Emily were the most popular first forenames for babies whose births were registered in 2014, National Records of Scotland (NRS) announced today. Jack was the top boys’ name for a seventh consecutive year, and Emily rose from third to replace Sophie as the most popular girls’ name.

James was the second most popular boys' name for the second year running, Lewis remained third and Oliver fourth. Logan (up one place to fifth), Daniel (down one place to sixth), Noah (up six places to seventh). Charlie (up one place to eighth), Lucas (down one place to ninth) and Alexander (down three places to tenth) make up the rest of the boys' Top Ten. Noah was the only new entrant to the boys' Top Ten; Harry (down five places to fifteenth) was the only name to drop out of it.

The fastest climbers within the boys’ Top Twenty were Noah, Max (up 6 places to 13th) and Adam (up 6 places to 14th). There were two new entrants to the boys’ Top Twenty: Aaron (up 8 places to 17th) and Cameron (up 4 places to 19th); Alfie and Riley dropped out.

Sophie was the second most popular girls’ name, after being top for the previous nine years. Olivia dropped from second to third, and Isla remained in fourth place. Jessica (up two places to fifth), Ava (which remained sixth), Amelia (up one place to seventh), Lucy (down three places to eighth), Lily (up two places to ninth), Ella (down one place to joint tenth) and Sophia (up three places to joint tenth) made up the rest of the girls’ Top Ten. Lily and Sophia were the only new entrants to the girls’ Top Ten; Millie (down five places to fifteenth) was the only name to drop out of it (NB: there is an “extra” new entrant to the Top Ten because two names were joint tenth).

The fastest climbers within the girls’ Top Twenty were Grace (up 5 places to 13th) and Freya (up 4 places to 14th). There were two new entrants to the girls’ Top Twenty: Eilidh (up 4 places to 19th) and Anna (up 5 places to 20th); Erin and Eva dropped out.

National Records of Scotland registered the births of almost 26,900 boys and over 25,600 girls in the first 11 months of 2014. The top fifty boys’ first names accounted for 41 per cent of all those registered and the top fifty girls’ first names accounted for 39 per cent of the registrations. Jack was the first name of only 2.0 per cent of the boys, and Emily was the first name of just 2.1 per cent of the girls.

Parents chose over 7,400 different first forenames for their children and almost 4,800 of these were unique (in the first 11 months of 2014).

Big climbers within the 2014 baby name top fifty charts include:

• Aaron (up 8 places to 17th)
• Callum (up 12 places to 21st)
• Rory (up 15 places to 27th)
• Oscar (up 9 places to joint 31st)
• Samuel (up 8 places to joint 38th)
• Layla (up 9 places to 25th)
• Molly (up 10 places to 35th)
• Sofia (up 8 places to 40th)

At the same time, NRS has added to its web site a new section on the Most Common Surnames in the Birth, Marriage and Death Registers. This gives, for each of a number of years, the surnames which appeared (in total) at least ten times in that year’s registers. The data show little change in the “top” surnames: for example, “Smith”, “Brown” and “Wilson” were first, second and third (respectively) in 1975, and in 1995, and in 2013.