Kathleen

547,321 people in America carry this name — ranked #77 of 923.

A name of the post-war decades.

Say it kath LEEN

2 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part

Phonetic transcription

K AE0 TH L IY1 N — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.

  • People counted 547,321 2020 Census
  • Per 100,000 181.2 about 1 in 606 people
  • As a surname 277 ranked #75,111 the other way round

The meaning and origin of Kathleen

Greek in origin, reading literally as “pure”.

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.

Kathleen through the years

714,162 babies were given this name since 1880. The busiest year was 1951, with 26,749 of them.

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

Most people carrying it were born in the 1950s. It has been given less 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 Kathleen

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

Better avoided

  • Kathleen Karen — same opening
  • Kathleen Nancy — runs together
  • Kathleen Nicole — runs together

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.

Going quiet

Kathleen has more than halved in three decades. The people carrying it belong mostly to the Baby Boomers.

Boys or girls: who is called Kathleen?

0.1% men
547,043 women

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

Full names people carry

The census counts first names and surnames separately and never together, so these are estimates: how often the two halves would meet if they paired at random. They do not — names cluster by community — so read them as an order of magnitude, not a headcount.

Where the name Kathleen is most common in the US

In Massachusetts the name is given 2.8 times as often as it is across the country.

  • Massachusetts ×2.8
  • Rhode Island ×2.3
  • Connecticut ×2.1
  • New Jersey ×2.0
  • the District of Columbia ×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.

Who has this name today

  • White alone (non-Hispanic) — 92.7%
  • Black or African American alone (non-Hispanic) — 1.7%
  • Hispanic or Latino origin — 2.4%
  • Two or more races — 1.6%
  • Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone — 1.3%

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.

How Kathleen is spelled

Kathleen is how 52% of them spell it — 1,047,281 people answer to the sound.

Each spelling is its own census entry — the counts never overlap, so the shares are of the group, not of the country.

Names about as common

The nearest entries above and below by number of people.

Names built the same way as Kathleen

Ends on the same sound

Same rhythm — 2 syllables, stress on the second

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

Try it First-Year Costs

Open First-Year Costs 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 Greek origin