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Colene

Girls' name

Variant of Colleen

Colene has been given to 1,624 babies in the U.S. since 1908. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1931, with 47 recorded.

Babies named Colene, 1997

1 in 725,000

Colene over time, 1880–2025

Girls
020406018801900192019401960198020002020

Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Colene: meaning, origin, and history

Variant of Colleen

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Colene means

Colene is a variant of Colleen.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Colene is used in English (Rare).

Another recorded pronunciation is /kɑ.ˈlin/ and /kɒ.ˈliːn/ for Colene.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Colene → Colleen. The family’s meaning is “girl”, recorded in English with the source elements cailín.

Origin, language, and formation

Colene is used in English.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Colleen.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 1,624 girls were recorded with the name Colene between 1908 and 1997. Its highest annual count was 47 in 1931; its best national rank was #1,025 in 1931.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Colene?

Colene had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 1997, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 1997
1 in 725,000
5 of 3,624,676 births
Among girls only
1 in 348,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 1997
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
502,488 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Colene sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Olivia (13,544)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 1997 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 502,488 children born in 1997 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Colene. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Colenes were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Colene was born before 1947 — so the typical Colene is around 78 today.

Median birth year
1947
About 78 years old
Biggest decade
1930s
22.0% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
16.4%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
764
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1930s — 22.0% of all recorded uses (358).

Is Colene rising or falling?

Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.

Rank vs 1 year ago
—
Not ranked then
Rank vs 5 years ago
New entry
Not ranked then
Rank vs 10 years ago
—
Not ranked then
Births vs 10 years ago
—
Not published both years
Share of its own peak
0%
Peak was 1931 (47)
Years since peak
94
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
34.1% average annual change
Best rank ever
#1,025
1931

Spellings of Colene

Colene is not the most common spelling — Arlene is, with 31.4% against Colene's 0.36%.

Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.

Where Colene is used

Across 1910–2025, Colene was most concentrated in North Carolina — about 1 in 50,000 girls, against 1 in 338,682 across all states with data. It was least common in Tennessee (1 in —).

02 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1North Carolina1 in 50,000
  2. 2Kentucky1 in 100,000
  3. 3Oklahoma1 in 100,000
  4. 4California1 in —
  5. 5Iowa1 in —
  6. 6Illinois1 in —
  7. 7Nebraska1 in —
  8. 8Pennsylvania1 in —

Shading is the share of that state's recorded girls given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Colene has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Colene around the world

Where Colene ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.

  • Scotland
    1985–1985
    #565
    in 1985
  • France
    1999–1999
    #4,846
    in 1999
  • South Australia
    1965–1965
    #674
    in 1965

Popularity data from National Records of Scotland, Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). NRS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Colene by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#1,025
1931
Peak year
1931
47 that year
First recorded
1908
Last recorded
1997
All-time count
1,624
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Colene

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

ColleneColbieCollinColettaCeleneCollynsEileneCollieAileneColleeneColbyColbiMyleneColeeneSereneAbileneColtonJazleneJheneEleneAdeleneColeyMayleneJoelene

Sibling names for Colene

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Colene

Top names of 1931, Colene's peak yearThe 1930s in fullOther names that peaked in 1931Girls' names starting with C