Hazel

80,463 people in America carry this name — ranked #660 of 923.

A name with a settled sense and a settled sound.

Say it HAY zuhl

2 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part

Phonetic transcription

HH EY1 Z AH0 L — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.

  • People counted 80,463 2020 Census
  • Rank #660 Familiar
  • Per 100,000 26.6 about 1 in 4,119 people

Where Hazel comes from and what it means

Hebrew in origin, reading literally as “one that sees God”.

Origins are a matter of scholarly argument rather than record, and a name can be traced more than one way. We state one reading and say where it came from.

Hazel through the years

274,058 babies were given this name since 1880. The busiest year was 1918, with 7,680 of them.

80 90 00 10 20s 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 00 10 20

Most people carrying it were born in the 1920s. It has been given more often of late.

Counted from Social Security card applications, so it covers births registered in the United States and leaves out names given to fewer than five babies in a year.

Middle names for Hazel

Two syllables sit with almost anything — the join matters more than the length.

Better avoided

  • Hazel Lisa — runs together
  • Hazel Laura — runs together
  • Hazel Hannah — same opening

Chosen by sound from the pronouncing dictionary, then ordered by how often the name is given. None of it is a rule — the ear decides.

Back after a long quiet

Hazel was given often, went out of use for decades, and is being given again. Few names do that — most fall and stay down.

Is Hazel used for boys or for girls?

0.7% men
79,885 women

As recorded on census returns, not as anyone thinks the name ought to be used.

Names built the same way as Hazel

Nothing else in the file ends on the same sound — a rare thing, and useful if you want a first name nobody will echo.

Same rhythm — 2 syllables, stress on the first

Matched on phonemes, not spelling, so the lists follow the ear rather than the page.

Who has this name today

  • White alone (non-Hispanic) — 64.4%
  • Black or African American alone (non-Hispanic) — 14.4%
  • Hispanic or Latino origin — 11.8%
  • Two or more races — 4.3%
  • Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone — 4.3%
  • American Indian and Alaska Native alone — 0.9%

Categories are how people answered the census — a fact about the bearers, not a property of the name. Conclusions are ours, not the Census Bureau’s.

Where the name Hazel is most common in the US

In Utah the name is given 2.7 times as often as it is across the country.

  • Utah ×2.7
  • Idaho ×2.5
  • Alaska ×2.2
  • Montana ×2.0
  • Oregon ×1.9

Measured against the state's own share of births since 1960, so a small state can lead a big one. Counted from Social Security card applications.

Names about as common

The nearest entries above and below by number of people.

Try it How Rare Is It?

Where this name sits between household and almost unheard of.

Familiar

  • People counted80,463
  • Rank#660
  • Roughly1 in 4,119 people

Open the full entry

Open How Rare Is It? on its own page

Where this page gets its numbers

  • Counts, ranks and shares: U.S. Census Bureau, 2020 Census tabulations of first and last names occurring 100 or more times. Percentages, bands and groupings are our own arithmetic — the conclusions are ours, not the Bureau’s.
  • Pronunciation, syllables and rhyme groups: CMU Pronouncing Dictionary, Carnegie Mellon University. The plain-English respelling is ours.
  • Origins and the forms a name takes in other languages: Charlotte Yonge, History of Christian Names, 1884 — a public-domain work. Scholarship has moved on since, so read it as one reading of a name, not the last word.

Below a hundred people we publish no figure at all — the same threshold the Census Bureau applies to us. What each source covers
Other names of Hebrew origin