Meaning and history
Paul comes from the Roman Paulus, meaning "small" in Latin. Saint Paul, originally a Jewish Roman citizen named Saul, became a major leader of the early Christian church after converting when the resurrected Jesus appeared to him; he then travelled the eastern Mediterranean as a missionary and wrote many New Testament epistles. His prominence made the name common among early Christians, and it was later borne by other saints and six popes. Rare in medieval England, Paul became more frequent from the 17th century and was especially popular in the 20th-century United States and United Kingdom; it has also been widely used in Germany and France. Notable bearers include Paul Revere, artists Paul Cézanne, Paul Gauguin, and Paul Klee, actor Paul Newman, and musicians Paul Simon and Paul McCartney, while fictional namesakes include Paul Bunyan and Dune's Paul Atreides.
20062006: 3,037 births, rank #132
2007: 2,771 births, rank #147
2008: 2,555 births, rank #154
2009: 2,428 births, rank #160
2010: 2,129 births, rank #177
20112011: 2,078 births, rank #186
2012: 1,958 births, rank #190
2013: 2,038 births, rank #198
2014: 2,007 births, rank #201
2015: 2,032 births, rank #199
20162016: 1,941 births, rank #206
2017: 1,699 births, rank #225
2018: 1,635 births, rank #234
2019: 1,513 births, rank #245
2020: 1,401 births, rank #252
20212021: 1,385 births, rank #257
2022: 1,334 births, rank #262
2023: 1,359 births, rank #256
2024: 1,330 births, rank #262
20252025: 1,316 births, rank #262
Paul held steady at #262 for boys between 2024 and 2025. Its highest annual birth count came in 1957, with 27,012 births.