Dallas
Meaning
place name/surname; meaning uncertain, possibly "meadow of the waterfall"
The story
Dallas is Scottish before it is Texan: a place name and surname from a village in Moray, its meaning uncertain, though meadow of the waterfall is the reading most often offered. Americans, of course, hear the city first, and the name has long carried a certain ten-gallon swagger. What the records show is patience: Dallas kept a modest, almost unchanging presence from the 1890s straight through the 1970s, never disappearing and never spiking. It stirred in the 1980s, coincidentally or not the decade the television drama Dallas ruled the airwaves, then found real momentum in the 2000s, and it has held its highest level on record through the 2010s and 2020s. It suits the moment: a place name with grit, a century of quiet patience behind it, and plenty of room to grow.
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Dallas peaked in the 2010s and the 2020s in nearly equal measure.
See popularity in Brazil
Popularity in Brazil
95 people · the #42,809 first name in Brazil · median age 39
Among people named Dallas living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 1980s than in any other decade.
Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
When you meet Dallas
Most people given the name Dallas in the United States are teenagers or young adults today.
Estimated from US Social Security birth registrations and typical lifespans; a rough guide, not a rule.
The Dallas deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Dallas truly comes from, how it traveled, and what a century of records reveals. If you have grown a tree on nametree, it also considers how Dallas fits with your family’s names and surname.
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