An in-depth study of New Zealanders named Chris.

*Unless otherwise specified, Chris includes Christoper and Christine, but not Christina, Christian or any other variant.

On 25 January 2023 Chris Hipkins made history. When he took the oath of office at Government House, he officially became New Zealand’s first Chris prime minister. Ten months later, he was succeeded by Christopher Luxon.

It was the first time New Zealand had managed successive leaders with the same first name since 1864 when Frederick Weld took over from Frederick Whitaker as colonial secretary.

The historical anomalies may not stop there. At the end of 2025 there were rumblings that Christopher Bishop may have been planning to roll Luxon as leader of the National Party, which would have made him the third Christopher prime minister in a row.

There is still a realistic world where Bishop could roll Luxon and then lose to Hipkins at the next election. The title of prime minister would then have gone from Chris to Chris and then to Chris to Chris.

How did we get here? How did New Zealand come to be so thoroughly dominated by Chrises?

While Chrises lead both major political parties, they also make up 10% of cabinet, and 3.25% of parliament, despite being just 0.75% of the total population (there are about 40,000 people alive in New Zealand named Chris, Christopher or Christine, based on baby name data and some rough approximations from immigration records).

The era of Chris isn’t limited to parliament. There are 14 Chrises in local government. The Companies Register lists 531 Chrises as active company directors. Chrises are some of the most powerful CEOs in the country, and include Chris Quin of Foodstuffs, Chris Blenkiron of Vector, Chris Hughes of Howden, and Chris Meehan of Winton Land Development.

Chrises have never been more prominent. Except in one field: sports. Sporting Chrises peaked in the 1990s.

Some of the most statistically notable ’90s Chrises include:

Christine Ross, who kicked 12 conversions in a single game for the Black Ferns against France in 1996, a kicking record that would stand for 21 years.
Chris Martin, one of only two cricketers to notch more test wickets than test runs.
Chris Nicholson, a cyclist and speed skater who is the only person to ever compete in three Olympic Games within just two years. He achieved this feat during the transition period when the Olympics switched to an alternative biennial schedule: he competed in both the Winter and Summer Games in 1992, followed by the Winter Games in 1994.

While Chrises shone brightly, their time in the sun is almost over. There is a crisis [chrisis?] of sporting Chrises. New Zealand did not send a single Chris to the 2024 Paris Olympics. There hasn’t been a Chris All Black since 2007. The name is fading. Soon, it will be gone forever.

The name Christopher comes from the Greek Christophoros, meaning “Christ-bearer” or “one who carries Christ”. Despite its proud origin, many of New Zealand’s early Chrises disavowed their given name. Christopher Richmond, a cabinet minister from 1856-61, went by his middle name, Matthew. Christopher Parr, who was mayor of Auckland City from 1911-1915 and later a four-term MP, preferred to be known as James.

New Zealand’s first openly Chris MP was Christopher Basstian who represented the Southland seat of Wallace in 1875. He won an extremely low turnout by-election with 57 total votes and was defeated in the general election four months later. His career is a mere blip on the historical record. His most notable speech in the house was to complain that the price of gunpowder made it too expensive to shoot rabbits.

It would be another 115 years before another Chris claimed a seat in parliament. Christine Fletcher broke the glass ceiling in 1990, followed by Chris Laidlaw in 1992 – who, as well as being the third Chris MP, was also the first Chris All Black.

The earliest evidence of a Chris in New Zealand appears to be Christopher Harris, who in 1833 was involved in a dispute with a whaling ship captain in Kororāreka about a liquor sale. He later married a Māori woman and is buried in Hokianga. The first Chris named on official immigration records is Christopher Maxwell, a 19-year-old passenger on the Aurora, the first settler ship which landed in Wellington on 22 January 1840.

These men were outliers. Throughout the 19th and early 20th centuries, Chrises were rare. In 1900, the first year for which Stats NZ has publicly available records, Christopher was the 110th most popular boys name, given to just 11 children. It ranked behind Dudley, Revers, and Percival. Christine didn’t make the list at all and wouldn’t appear until 1923. (Stats NZ only lists names given to at least 10 children in any year).

The popularity of Christopher slowly started ticking up throughout the 1930s and 40s, and it cracked the top 10 for the first time in 1953: 10th place, with 476 births. Its highest annual ranking was 4th in 1984, though by total births it peaked in 1968 with 705. Christopher hovered around the top 10 for four decades until 1994, when it entered a steep decline.

Christine followed a similar trajectory, but burned brighter and flamed out sooner. It cracked the top 10 for the first time in 1948 and held the number 1 spot from 1951-54, peaking with 811 Christines born in 1953. The name hovered around the top three until 1963 when it fell into disuse.

The median Christine in New Zealand is 65 years old, while the median Christopher is 51 – the exact midpoint of Luxon and Hipkins’ ages.

The rise of Chris is part of a bigger story about New Zealand society in the post-war period. For the first time, New Zealand parents moved away from traditional English names like Charles, Arthur and George and embraced modern names, drawing from literature, American TV, and particularly the New Testament.

Chris was part of a cohort of names that exploded in popularity around the same time, roughly defining Generation X and some of the later Baby Boomers.

It was the expression of an emerging national identity, a country that had come back from war and now saw itself as truly independent, not a mere extension of Britain. That independent identity, though, was still rooted in the monoculture. People watched the same TV shows, followed the same sports, consumed the same news and gave their sons the same names.

Over time, New Zealanders have become more creative with their baby names as originality became trendier than tradition. In 2024, 968 first names reached double digits, compared to 504 in 1954. The distribution of names has become less top-heavy: the most popular name in 2024, Noah, was given to 251 children. Christopher peaked at 705 in 1968. The record for most babies given the same name in a single year is 1575, by John in 1948.

Chrises will remain prominent for another couple of decades, but then it looks like they will all but disappear. In 2024, there were just 24 Christophers and 13 Chrises born, the 219th and 370th most popular boys’ names respectively. Christine hasn’t cracked double digits since 2014. Chrises are outranked by names including Aaliyah, Rehamt, Te Ariki, and three different spellings of Muhammad.

Over the coming decades, a new generation of names look like they will rise to the top of New Zealand society: Sarah, Jessica, Joshua and Matthew. By the time the babies of the 2000s reach their career peaks, Olivers and Olivias will be leading the way.

Even at their peak, however, those names will never reach the cultural ubiquity that Chris has achieved. Chris is a symbol of a particular era of New Zealand, a time that many people idealise in their memories, but which will never return. Time marches forward, ceaselessly, and Chris is dragged along with it.