Brazilian baby names: the 1960s
Which names did Brazilian families choose the most in the 1960s? In the open data of IBGE, Brazil's national statistics institute, collected in the 2010 Census, Maria leads among girls born in that decade, with 2,488,835 Brazilians, and Jose comes first among boys, with 1,239,593. The tables below list each sex's top 20 with the official frequencies, and the analysis that follows shows what changed from the previous decade.
Girls' top 20 of the 1960s
| # | Name | People |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Maria | 2,488,835 |
| 2 | Ana | 292,228 |
| 3 | Marcia | 134,578 |
| 4 | Francisca | 129,893 |
| 5 | Sandra | 128,453 |
| 6 | Vera | 126,099 |
| 7 | Sonia | 125,000 |
| 8 | Antonia | 104,239 |
| 9 | Rita | 95,631 |
| 10 | Lucia | 91,840 |
| 11 | Marlene | 91,531 |
| 12 | Rosangela | 89,716 |
| 13 | Aparecida | 81,510 |
| 14 | Sueli | 77,956 |
| 15 | Claudia | 72,775 |
| 16 | Marli | 71,895 |
| 17 | Regina | 71,376 |
| 18 | Rosa | 70,866 |
| 19 | Fatima | 69,450 |
| 20 | Tania | 67,970 |
Boys' top 20 of the 1960s
| # | Name | People |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Jose | 1,239,593 |
| 2 | Antonio | 530,320 |
| 3 | Joao | 428,482 |
| 4 | Francisco | 330,798 |
| 5 | Carlos | 266,771 |
| 6 | Paulo | 264,120 |
| 7 | Luiz | 197,923 |
| 8 | Luis | 162,615 |
| 9 | Marcos | 137,532 |
| 10 | Raimundo | 134,739 |
| 11 | Pedro | 132,611 |
| 12 | Jorge | 112,865 |
| 13 | Manoel | 112,706 |
| 14 | Sergio | 106,642 |
| 15 | Roberto | 104,867 |
| 16 | Sebastiao | 101,084 |
| 17 | Edson | 89,893 |
| 18 | Geraldo | 86,727 |
| 19 | Claudio | 74,942 |
| 20 | Marcelo | 66,996 |
What the 1960s changed
Against the previous decade, in the girls' top 20, Marcia, Rosangela, Claudia, Marli and Tania made their debuts, pushing out Terezinha, Josefa, Raimunda, Luzia and Tereza; on the boys' side, Marcos, Edson, Claudio and Marcelo made their debuts, pushing out Benedito, Mario, Manuel and Joaquim.
Sandra made the biggest climb among girls, from rank 20 to 5; Luis made the biggest climb among boys, from rank 11 to 8.
The margin at the top says a lot: Maria was registered 8.5 times as often as Ana, the second girls' name, a narrower gap than the previous decade (13.5); among boys, Jose ran 2.3 times ahead of Antonio, a wider gap than the previous decade (2.2).
Compare with the 1950s, when Maria and Jose led, and with the 1970s, which crowned Maria and Jose. The archive The names of Brazil shows the whole timeline at once.
Source: IBGE (Brazil's national statistics institute), 2010 Census, open data. The numbers come from the 2010 Demographic Census and count people alive and living in Brazil that year, grouped by their decade of birth: the oldest decades reflect only those who made it to 2010. Everything here is aggregate public statistics, with no individual records. Snapshot of 2026-07-10.
Last updated: · Methodology and sources