Karl is a distinctive choice, ranked #2089 in 2024. Your child is likely to be the only Karl in their class.
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UK Rank 2024
#2089
About the Name Karl
Karl has seen a notable decline in recent years, dropping 597 places in five years. It was most popular in 1996 at #110 — parents choosing it today are making a deliberately counter-trend decision. The name has been a consistent presence in UK records since 1996.
Karl is distinctive enough that your child will likely be the only one in both their class and their school — standing out on every register.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about the name Karl
Unlikely. With around 11 UK babies named Karl per year, your child will almost certainly be the only Karl in his class, and possibly the only one in the whole school.
Karl has been declining in UK popularity, dropping 597 places in the last five years. Its peak was #110 in 1996. Choosing it now means he is likely to be among the last of his generation with this name.
Karl is a distinctive choice sitting outside the mainstream UK top names. Parents choosing less common names often find their children appreciate the individuality as they grow up, rarely needing to add an initial to distinguish themselves.
Notable people named Karl include: Lennart Karl — Lennart Karl is a German professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder or winger for Bundesliga club Bayern Munich and the Germany national...; Karl Pilkington — Karl Pilkington is an English presenter, actor and author.; Karl von Habsburg — Karl von Habsburg is an Austrian politician and the head of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine, the former royal house of the defunct Austro-Hungarian thrones..
Karl does not appear in the US top 1,000 baby names, making it a distinctively British choice — your child is unlikely to encounter American Karls in the wild.
11
UK babies named Karl (2024)
< 1
Expected classmates with this name (class of 28)
~0.0
In a school of 600
↓ 597 places
Rank change (last 5 years)
🏫 Who else is in the room?
In a typical UK class of 28, highlighted children share the name Karl
Likely around 1 other Karl in the class
UK Popularity (1996–2024)
Rank and birth count · ONS official data
No US data available for this name
✨ Similar names to Karl
Names with a similar style — each with their own classroom story
Lennart Karl is a German professional footballer who plays as an attacking midfielder or winger for Bundesliga club Bayern Munich and the Germany national team.
Karl Pilkington is an English presenter, actor and author. After working with Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant as producer on their Xfm radio show, Pilkington became a co-host of The Ricky Gervais Show due to unique and unorthodox opinions and views he often expressed, and Gervais's and Merchant's fascination with them.
Karl von Habsburg is an Austrian politician and the head of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine, the former royal house of the defunct Austro-Hungarian thrones. As a citizen of the Republic of Austria, his legal name is Karl Habsburg-Lothringen.
Karl Marx was a German philosopher, social and political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet The Communist Manifesto (written with Friedrich Engels), and his three-volume Das Kapital, a critique of classical political economy which employs his theory of historical materialism in an analysis of capitalism, in the culmination of his life's work.
Sir Karl Raimund Popper was an Austrian–British philosopher, academic and social commentator. One of the 20th century's most influential philosophers of science, Popper is known for his rejection of the classical inductivist views on the scientific method in favour of empirical falsification made possible by his falsifiability criterion, and for founding the Department of Philosophy at the London School of Economics and Political Science.
Karl Dönitz was a German naval officer and politician who, following the suicide of Adolf Hitler during the Second World War in April 1945, succeeded him as head of state of Germany during the Nazi era. He held the position until the dissolution of the Flensburg Government following Germany's unconditional surrender to the Allies weeks later.