Fun Facts About the Name Stokes
- 196 babies named Stokes: U.S. records list 196 babies given the name Stokes from 1880 through 2025.
What Does the Name Stokes Mean?
Stokes is an English name meaning "dweller at the stoke" - an outlying farm, cattle farm, or dependent settlement. It comes from Middle English stok(e), which descends from Old English stoc, a word with several connected senses: a place or spot, a secondary settlement attached to a main one, a dairy or livestock farm, and occasionally a religious foundation. The surname was either topographic, given to someone who lived by such a farm, or habitational, taken from one of the many English places called Stoke or Stokes. The final -s is the ordinary English surname ending, marking a plural or possessive form - in effect, "of Stokes."
Words such as stock share the same Germanic root, but the sense in this name is a place, not livestock or goods. In parts of England settled by Scandinavians, some place names containing this element may instead reflect Old Norse stokkr, "log, tree trunk" - sometimes a log laid down as a footbridge - and it is often impossible to tell which of the two words lies behind a particular place name.
Stokes Name History & Origins
The name grew out of the medieval English practice of naming people after where they lived or held land. Because stoc was such a common element in English place names - Stoke-on-Trent, Stoke Newington, Stoke Poges, and many smaller Stokes and Stoke farms - a man who moved away from such a place might be recorded as "John of Stokes," and that description could harden into a hereditary surname. Surnames of this kind became fixed in England between roughly the twelfth and fourteenth centuries, so Stokes appears in medieval English records as a surname long before it was used as a personal name.
As a given name, Stokes is uncommon and is almost always taken from the surname rather than from a saint, a biblical figure, or a literary work, which is why it carries no traditional meaning beyond its place-name origin. Families who use it are generally passing on a surname from a parent's or grandparent's line. The surname itself has notable bearers, among them the Irish mathematician and physicist George Gabriel Stokes (1819 - 1903), after whom Stokes' law and Stokes' theorem are named.
How Popular is the Name Stokes?
Stokes has historically been an exceptionally rare given name in the United States, remaining well outside the national mainstream. It saw its highest recorded annual births in 1916. Its best rank was #1,053 in 1892.
U.S. name popularity from 1880-2025, based on SSA data. Rank shows how the name compares with other names - lower numbers mean greater popularity. Births shows how many babies received the name each year.
| Year | Rank | Births | % |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | #9,595 | 8 | 0.0005% |
| 2024 | #7,650 | 11 | 0.0006% |
| 2023 | #12,048 | 6 | 0.0004% |
| 2022 | #10,702 | 7 | 0.0004% |
| 2021 | #8,737 | 9 | 0.0005% |
| 2020 | #11,835 | 6 | 0.0003% |
| 2014 | #13,798 | 5 | 0.0003% |
| 2008 | #12,350 | 6 | 0.0003% |
| 2006 | #11,865 | 6 | 0.0003% |
| 2003 | #8,522 | 8 | 0.0004% |
| 2002 | #12,245 | 5 | 0.0003% |
| 1948 | #3,623 | 6 | 0.0003% |
| 1947 | #3,339 | 7 | 0.0004% |
| 1943 | #3,985 | 5 | 0.0004% |
| 1934 | #4,142 | 5 | 0.0005% |
| 1931 | #3,071 | 8 | 0.0008% |
| 1930 | #4,483 | 5 | 0.0005% |
| 1926 | #3,663 | 7 | 0.0006% |
| 1924 | #4,289 | 6 | 0.0005% |
| 1922 | #2,779 | 11 | 0.0010% |
| 1921 | #2,783 | 11 | 0.0010% |
| 1920 | #3,182 | 9 | 0.0008% |
| 1918 | #4,114 | 6 | 0.0006% |
| 1917 | #3,918 | 6 | 0.0006% |
| 1916 | #2,520 | 11 | 0.0012% |
| 1914 | #3,698 | 5 | 0.0008% |
| 1903 | #1,290 | 5 | 0.0042% |
| 1892 | #1,053 | 6 | 0.0049% |
Name popularity over more than a century, based on Social Security Administration data. Gaps in the chart indicate years when the name does not appear in the published records.
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How the Name Stokes Shapes Your Personality and Life?
You are spiritually intense and can sting or charm. Your name brings love and new starts into life and attracts money. In business, you are the creator and promoter of original ideas and usually enjoy considerable financial success. You are frank, methodical and believe in law, system and order.
Position and social status is very important for you and you are always looking for way to improve your position in society. You have power and ability to chose your own destiny and achieve anything you want in life. You can expand in any direction according to your will and the set of values. You have passion for justice and belong to the position of authority. You have an inherent courage and endurance to accomplish "The Impossible Dream". With the power comes responsibility. You hold keys to the material world, but with this gift comes high spiritual responsibility to be fair and true to others. You are philosophical and mature, determined and intense with a desire to endure, often religious.
✦ Stokes's Deeper Meaning & Tips for Parents Discover Stokes's symbolic numbers and practical tips for choosing a name that complements your child's birth date.