Julian

What Julian means

Means “Roman personal name”

Learned borrowing from Latin Iūliānus (“Roman personal name”), shortened by the loss of the Latin nominative ending -us.

Source: Wiktionary, “Julian” (revision 94540622), CC BY-SA 4.0. Quoted from the etymology; we don’t write our own.

How popular is Julian?

US: Rising: up from #45 in 2015. England & Wales: Falling: down from #272 in 2015.

Biggest US share so far: 2019, when 8,443 boys got the name (#31 that year). First in the US records in 1880.

How common

• About 1 in 225 baby boys in the US in 2025
• About 1 in 1,929 baby boys in England and Wales in 2025
• About 1 in 854 baby boys in Scotland in 2025

“1 in N” divides by all listed births for that sex. The US list leaves out names given to fewer than 5 babies, and the UK lists leave out names given to 2 or fewer, so the real figure is a little rarer than shown.

Where in the US

Most popular in DC (11.08 per 1,000 boys), RI (9.92 per 1,000 boys), CA (9.57 per 1,000 boys) in 2025.

SSA state data, 2025. Share of all listed boys born in each state.

US vs UK

Julian is #25 in the US and #314 in England & Wales (2025).

Same sex as this page (boys). SSA (US), ONS (England and Wales), NRS (Scotland).

Boy or girl?

In 2025, 99.7% of US babies named Julian were boys.

Counts below the publishing threshold (US 5, UK 3) are not included.

How to say it

IPA from Wiktionary.

Other spellings parents chose in 2025

• Julien380 US · 6 E&W
• Jullian23 US
• Julion7 US

Names that sound the same and differ by a letter or two, with baby counts for the same sex. US and E&W counts.

If you like Julian

Boys

• Sebastian#16“august, venerable, exalted”^*
• Titus#358“honorable”^*
• Atticus#281“the Attic, the Athenian, a cognomen”^*
• Lukas#288“a man from Lucania”^*
• Magnus#763“great”^*
• Lucas#10Editor’s note Up from #16 in 2015 to #10 in 2025 in the US. About 1 in 170 US boys in the 2025 records

For a sister

• Lilliana#445Editor’s note Down from #270 in 2015 to #445 in 2025 in the US
• Harmony#276From the word “harmony”^*
• Arabella#213Editor’s note Steady in the US: #194 in 2015 and #213 in 2025
• Stella#52“star”^*
• Lucy#24“light”^*
• Liliana#78Form of Lilian, possibly meaning “lily”^*

Picked from the US top 1,000 in 2025: names Wiktionary also files under Latin, whose US popularity since 1990 rose and fell most like Julian’s. Rank is US 2025.