If it feels like newborn names are getting shorter, you are not imagining it.
Past trending
Data from the Statistical Office of the Republic of Slovenia show that in 1992 the average name length was 5.2 letters for girls and 4.9 letters for boys. By the early 2020s, the average for both had dropped to 4.4 letters. Compared with the 1990s, the share of newborns with names of four letters or fewer increased markedly. For girls, it rose from 45% to 65%; for boys, from 44% to 59%.
New trending
While the average length of boys’ names has remained stably low at around 4.4 letters over the past 15 years, girls’ names have started to lengthen again in the last three years. In 2024, the average name length for newborn girls reached 4.6 letters, the longest since 2003.
Longest names
In the 2020s, Maksimilijan, with 12 characters, was the longest boys’ name. For girls, the longest names were Anastazija, Anastasia, Aleksandra, and Klementina, each with 10 characters. Naming him Nik or Tim, and her Ema or Mia, probably saves a fair amount of time over a lifetime.
