Oscar

212,946 people in America carry this name — ranked #263 of 923.

Most Americans carrying it were born this century.

Say it AWS kur

2 syllables · the capitals are the stressed part

Phonetic transcription

AO1 S K ER0 — ARPAbet, as published in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. The digit on a vowel marks its stress.

  • People counted 212,946 2020 Census
  • Rank #263 Common
  • Per 100,000 70.5 about 1 in 1,556 people
  • As a surname 1,875 ranked #15,103 the other way round

The meaning and origin of Oscar

Celtic in origin, reading literally as “bounding warrior”.

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.

How often Oscar has been given

205,535 babies were given this name since 1880. The busiest year was 2006, with 3,607 of them.

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

Most people carrying it were born in the 2000s. 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 Oscar

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

Better avoided

  • Oscar Robert — runs together
  • Oscar Richard — runs together
  • Oscar Ronald — 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.

Never out of use

Oscar has been given in every decade on record — no fashion lifted it and none has dropped it.

Is Oscar a boy's or a girl's name?

99.8% men
443 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.

Names about as common

The nearest entries above and below by number of people.

Same syllables and stress as Oscar

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.

The same name abroad

  • Osgar Gaelic

Forms of one name traced to the same root. Spellings are as the glossary printed them, so some look older than the versions in use today.

Who answers to it now

  • White alone (non-Hispanic) — 9.6%
  • Black or African American alone (non-Hispanic) — 4.3%
  • Hispanic or Latino origin — 83.2%
  • Two or more races — 0.7%
  • Asian and Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander alone — 1.9%

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.

The states where Oscar is most common

In California the name is given 2.4 times as often as it is across the country.

  • California ×2.4
  • Texas ×2.3
  • Arizona ×2.1
  • Nevada ×1.9
  • New Mexico ×1.6

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.

Try it Adult Height

Open Adult Height 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 Celtic origin