Xian
Given to 463 babies in the United States, 1990 to 2025. Every figure below is a count of birth registrations, not an estimate.
By register
By decade, every selected register together
Asked and held nothing for this name: Scotland (1974–2025), Ireland (1964–2025), Norway (1945–2025), Sweden (1998–2022), Belgium (2016–2025), Austria (1984–2025), Switzerland (2000–2025), Greenland (2002–2025). That is not a count of nought — each of those registers was searched and does not carry this spelling. Every one withholds its smallest counts, on its own rule, so a name can be real there and still absent from what they publish.
Narrow these tables
The sum at the top of each table adds counts that were not made on the same rule — the Americans publish a name only where five or more babies were given it in a year, ONS redact any name given to two or fewer in total, Finland counts living citizens rather than births. It is an indication of how widely the name is recorded, not a measurement of how many people have it.
How it is said
zjˈɑn
From the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, free for any use. The symbols are IPA, converted from CMU's notation by the published correspondence. Two things in that conversion are ours rather than theirs: an unstressed vowel is written as a schwa, and the stress mark sits before the stressed vowel rather than at the start of its syllable — CMU record no syllable boundaries, so placing it properly would mean guessing where the syllables fall.
Where these numbers come from
United States, 1880 to 2025
As a girl's name, Xian was registered 87 times in the United States between 1990 and 2019, most often in the 2000s.
As a boy's name, Xian was registered 376 times in the United States between 1990 and 2025, most often in the 2010s.
England and Wales, 1996 to 2025
34 babies, from a register that begins in 1996. Its decades cannot be compared with the American ones, which reach back to 1880: where the two tables above put them in the same row, they are counting different lengths of record.
Source: Office for National Statistics. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. The registers withhold small counts on different rules — ONS redact a name given to two or fewer babies in total, and the Americans hide one given to fewer than five in a year — so a name in one table and not another may only have met different thresholds.
Scotland
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Scottish figures for 1974 to 2025. NRS suppress any name given to two or fewer babies in a year, so this means the name was rare there rather than unknown.
Northern Ireland
On the register, with the number withheld. Xian appears in the Northern Irish figures in 2 separate years, and NISRA publish no count for any of them: the name went to fewer than three babies in each of those years, and they withhold the number rather than the name. That is not a count of nought — it is a name somebody was given.
NISRA fold accents before publishing, in their words: “Names containing accents have been recorded without those accents.” Only Scotland does the same. So a Northern Irish figure covers every accenting of a name and most of the figures beside it do not.
Ireland
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Irish figures for 1964 to 2025. The CSO list a name once it has reached three babies in any single year, so this means the name never did.
Norway
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Norwegian figures for 1945 to 2025. SSB list only names used by at least two hundred people in the previous year, so an absence here usually means the name was never that common in Norway rather than never used.
Sweden
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Swedish figures for 1998 to 2022. SCB published a name only where at least two babies of that sex were given it, and at least ten before 2004, so this means the name never cleared that bar.
France, 1900 to 2023
31 babies, from a register that begins in 1900. Its decades cannot be compared with the American ones, which reach back to 1880: where the two tables above put them in the same row, they are counting different lengths of record.
Source: Insee. Licence Ouverte / Open Licence 2.0 (Etalab). The registers withhold small counts on different rules — Insee withhold the YEAR rather than the name, pooling the births of a name given to fewer than three babies of a sex in a year into one undated record, and the Americans hide one given to fewer than five in a year — so a name in one table and not another may only have met different thresholds.
Belgium
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Belgian figures for 2016 to 2025. Statbel publish a figure only where at least five babies in a single municipality were given the name, so this means it never reached five in any one town — not that no Belgian child has it.
Austria
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Austrian figures for 1984 to 2025. Statistik Austria suppress no name and no figure, so unlike every other register here this means the name was not given to a baby registered in Austria, rather than that it was given too few times to print.
Switzerland
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Swiss figures for 2000 to 2025. the Federal Statistical Office publish a fixed list of first names and do not say how a name gets onto it. So this may mean the name was never given in Switzerland, or only that it is not on that list.
Poland, 2000 to 2025
2 babies, from a register that begins in 2000. Its decades cannot be compared with the American ones, which reach back to 1880: where the two tables above put them in the same row, they are counting different lengths of record.
Source: the Ministry of Digitisation, from the PESEL register. Dedicated to the public domain under CC0 1.0, which asks for no credit at all. The registers withhold small counts on different rules — the Polish threshold moved in the middle of its own series — a name given fewer than five times in a year was left out up to 2012, and fewer than two from 2013, and the Americans hide one given to fewer than five in a year — so a name in one table and not another may only have met different thresholds.
The number of Polish names published went from 978 in 2012 to 1,979 in 2013. Polish naming did not double in a year: the bar moved from five to two. It is the same thing Sweden did in 2004, and the clearest reason on this page to distrust a jump in a count of names as against a count of babies.
Poland is the only register here that publishes a second given name separately, and both are counted, so a child registered Anna Maria is an Anna and a Maria. Second names appear only from 2019 while first names run from 2000 — 387,691 first names in 2019 against 560,227 once second names are added — so the Polish figures step up that year for a reason that belongs to what was published, not to what anyone was called. Surnames are never counted here, in any register.
Poland publishes its names in capitals — ZOFIA, JAKUB — and they are shown here in ordinary case. That is a change to what was published, and it is the only one made to any figure or name on this site.
Canada, 1991 to 2024
98 babies, from a register that begins in 1991. Its decades cannot be compared with the American ones, which reach back to 1880: where the two tables above put them in the same row, they are counting different lengths of record.
Source: Statistics Canada, table 17-10-0147-01. Adapted from Statistics Canada, First names at birth by sex at birth, 1991–2024. This does not constitute an endorsement by Statistics Canada of this product. The registers withhold small counts on different rules — Statistics Canada withhold any name given to fewer than five babies in a year, and publish no single-letter name — the same bar as the Americans, set by a different authority, and the Americans hide one given to fewer than five in a year — so a name in one table and not another may only have met different thresholds.
Canada is usually said not to have a national name register, because births are registered province by province and most published lists are provincial top tens stitched together. Statistics Canada do assemble them: this is one table for the whole country, built from the Canadian Vital Statistics birth database together with Retraite Québec’s list of names.
Argentina, 2012 to 2024
101 people on the register, from a register that begins in 2012. Its decades cannot be compared with the American ones, which reach back to 1880: where the two tables above put them in the same row, they are counting different lengths of record.
Source: RENAPER, the Dirección Nacional de Población. Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. The registers withhold small counts on different rules — RENAPER publish no count below two, and publish no sex at all — the column here is every baby, not girls and boys apart, and the Americans hide one given to fewer than five in a year — so a name in one table and not another may only have met different thresholds.
Two things about the Argentine column are unlike every other on this page. RENAPER publish no sex: their file with a sex column holds 169 names, and the one used here holds 14,917 and does not say. Splitting a figure between girls and boys would invent the only thing it leaves out, so the column is simply everybody.
And it counts the living, not births registered. RENAPER count people nacidas vivas e identificadas
— born alive and holding a document — as the register stood in September 2024. So a 2012 figure is how many people born that year were still on the register twelve years later, not how many babies were registered then. Anyone who died, or never received a document, is not counted. Every other register on this site counts the birth itself.
One more difference, and this one is a gain: Argentina counts every given name, so a child called María Sofía is a María and a Sofía. Surnames are never counted here, in any register.
Finland
Counted, but not dated. Xian is a name in force for 6 living Finnish citizens, and not one of them has a year of birth published against them. DVV publish no year of birth at all, so there is nothing to date this to. It is a census of names in use on 3 August 2026.
Source: Digital and Population Data Services Agency (DVV). Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0. The registers withhold small counts on different rules — DVV publish no name held by fewer than five people, and apply that threshold separately to first names and to middle names.
The Finnish column is not a count of births, and it is the furthest from one on this site. DVV count the names in force of living Finnish citizens, resident in Finland or abroad. So somebody who has died is not counted at all; somebody who changed their name is counted under the new one; a Finnish citizen in Sydney is counted and a resident of Helsinki who is not a citizen is not. Every other register here counts an event in a territory.
And there are no years in it whatever — not a range trimmed for space, but no year column at all. What it is good at is breadth: DVV publish every name held by five or more people, first names and middle names alike, which is why Finland brings more names to this site than any register but the American and French ones. Surnames are published separately and are never used here.
Greenland
Not in this register. Xian does not appear in the Greenlandic figures for 2002 to 2025. Statistics Greenland suppress nothing, so — as with Austria — this means no resident of Greenland born since 2002 has the name, rather than that it was too rare to print.
The Social Security Administration publish the name on every United States birth registration from 1880 onward, and dedicate the data to the public domain under CC0. This page adds nothing to it: the counts are theirs, grouped by decade.
One gap, and it matters here more than anywhere. SSA publish a name only where five or more babies were given it in a year. A name you cannot find is not a name nobody used — it is a name used four times or fewer, and no site built on this data can see it.
The pronunciation above comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, which covers some names and not others. Meanings are not here yet. When they arrive they will come from named scholarship old enough to be out of copyright, and where two authorities disagree the page will say so rather than picking one.