I built an interactive visualization that guesses your age just from your first name [OC]

Posted by rhiever

45 comments
  1. Data source: Social Security Administration (SSA) baby name records from 1880-2023; CDC/SSA actuarial life tables

    Tools: Python for data processing; JavaScript for interactive visualization

  2. The name I go by was 2 years off, my actual name was way off but that’s a much less common name.

  3. 26 people with my name were born in the same year as me and 25 are still alive. That’s not a lot

  4. Very cool! You’ve also confirmed my theory that Karen is a boomer name, not gen-x.

  5. It guessed 2006. I was born in 1986. It was really cool to see how unpopular my name used to be though.

    ETA: I checked my mom’s name and that one was spot on! (Marianne, 1957)

  6. Seeing all the ones “still alive” makes it seem like a name competition to the death.

  7. >Median … born around 1960 and ranges from 27 to 79 years old

    OP to be fair, I am between 27 and 79 years old.

    I think the age discrepancy reflects worse on my parents’ naming choice than it does the tool…

    But really, this is awesome. I’m gonna have a lot of fun with it.

  8. Yesterday I just happened to watch Stephen Wilson Jr.’s performance of his song “Gary” on Theo Von’s podcast, and the song is basically premised on this insight, that particular names correspond to generations.

    He sings in the chorus, “There ain’t a lot of boys named Gary these days” and “Ain’t a lot of girls going by Debbie anymore”. What’s cool is with your website, the data actually checks out:

    * [https://name-age-calculator.randalolson.com/male/gary](https://name-age-calculator.randalolson.com/male/gary) (median of 1958)
    * [https://name-age-calculator.randalolson.com/female/debbie](https://name-age-calculator.randalolson.com/female/debbie) (median of 1960)

    Song performance: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxsfQQxCSik](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxsfQQxCSik)

  9. I hate that this website lets me know how many of them are still alive.

    I have/had a friend who is now part of the 12 people named his year who aren’t with us.

  10. Mine was decades off. But apparently it peaked at 800 men in the 1950’s. While I looked at ā€œMikeā€ and its peak was 11K. Guess my name really isn’t common.

  11. It was just one year off! It guessed 2013, I was born in 2012. My sister was 6 years off (expected 2013, actual 2019), my mom was 14 years off (guessed 1997, actual 1983) and my dad was 16 years off (expected 1997, actual 1981).

  12. Very cool. Guessed mine for 2008 & born pre 1980’s. Doesn’t have my daughter’s name in it. But very cool!

  13. Is it normalised by birth rate? Would be more interesting as a percent of people born in each year with a given name rather than an absolute number

  14. Ya got me pegged– only one year off from the peak!

    The depressing thing is that of the 2875 boys with my first name, only 2390 are still alive. šŸ™

  15. Interesting to see that there are some Americans with my very non American name… date is completely off as expected for same reason šŸ™‚

  16. My daughter’s name does not show up prior to 2002, but she was born in 2001, so it seems like some data is missing? (Rare South Asian name less than 10 a year from 2002 onwards and none prior to 2002).

  17. Something a little weird, my sister born in 2015 was one of 15 with her given name. She passed away two years ago and it still says 15/15 are alive. I’m curious why that might be. (she was a US citizen). I’m not giving her name for privacy’s sake.

  18. Wont work for me as I am the only one with that First Name (Udett)

  19. I like it, but please do something about the floating box. On a phone, it covers the graph no matter where you put it. Obnoxious.

  20. Ah. It was pretty far out on mine, but a) I’m not American and b) I have a name which was repeated down multiple generations which is the reason that I’m called it regardless of the era 😊

  21. Really fun to play with, thanks for making this and sharing it!

  22. Oh this is much nicer looking than your old one. Same simple functionality though which I appreciate.

  23. Yeah, no. Guessed my age wrong by about two decades, and my fiancĆ©’s name by about four decades wrong. Don’t think I need to spell out the inherent flaws in why this is not even remotely possible with just the first name.

  24. Everyone named ‘Eagle’ in this database is still alive. Who will be the first to go?

  25. Damn, got both me + my partner wrong (got me wrong by 30 years!) The only thing it got right was my middle name but the spread was 40 years lol so…

  26. It just gives you a median age. Clickbait title is clickbait.

  27. Didn’t work for me very well, you get a double peak with my name so the estimate is 25-71

  28. the year it guessed I was born, is the year I graduated high school šŸ˜‚ but I was always surrounded by girls with a similar name to mine, but I was always the only one with my exact name. very cool experiment!!

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