Esteban
Meaning
form of Stephen, Greek "crown"
The story
Esteban is Stephen in Spanish, the Greek stephanos, the crown, worn the Iberian way, and its American record walks the same patient stairs as Rafael, Javier, Manuel and Eduardo: higher every decade from the 1930s through the 2000s, seven consecutive rises, about 350 becoming 8,700, then the family's settle, 7,500 in the 2010s and 4,100 so far this decade, every one of them a boy this decade. All-time: about 35,600 boys to 31 girls. The wider family is enormous, Stephen about 866,000 and Steven about 1,297,400, both storied here, and Esteban is the spelling that kept the crown's Spanish weight. Seven decades of rising is the community-carried signature our records keep finding on this shelf: slow, steady, and never once a spike.
Esteban around the world
One shared root links 11 names across 5 languages.
Shared root: from Greek stephanos "crown, garland"
The constellation
More branches
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Esteban peaked in the 2000s and the 2020s in nearly equal measure.
See popularity in Brazil
Popularity in Brazil
620 people · the #11,541 first name in Brazil · about 1 in 333,333 · median age 26
Among people named Esteban living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 2010s than in any other decade.
The census also counted 52 born between 2020 and August 2022, too recent a span to chart.
Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
When you meet Esteban
Most people given the name Esteban 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 Esteban deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Esteban 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 Esteban fits with your family’s names and surname.
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