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Kathaleen

Girls' name

Meaning and linguistic origin unconfirmed

Kathaleen has been given to 4,136 babies in the U.S. since 1902. 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 1952, with 143 recorded.

Babies named Kathaleen, 2008

1 in 786,000

Kathaleen over time, 1880–2025

Girls
05010015018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Kathaleen: meaning, origin, and history

Meaning and linguistic origin unconfirmed

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Kathaleen means

Kathaleen is a given name.

The naming story behind Kathaleen

Wikidata records Kathaleen as a female given name. The entity identifier is Q113111413, and the classification was checked on 2026-10-20. The spelling matches a source label or alias exactly, without removing accents or linking it to a name merely because the letters look similar.

A database classification is different from an etymological explanation, so those questions remain open in the short meaning.

A modern root explanation needs an additional naming or linguistic reference.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 4,136 girls were recorded with the name Kathaleen between 1902 and 2008. Its highest annual count was 143 in 1952; its best national rank was #741 in 1952.

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.

How common is Kathaleen?

Kathaleen had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2008, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2008
1 in 786,000
5 of 3,930,727 births
Among girls only
1 in 378,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2008
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
544,916 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Kathaleen 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 2008 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 544,916 children born in 2008 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Kathaleen. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Kathaleens were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Kathaleen was born before 1950 — so the typical Kathaleen is around 75 today.

Median birth year
1950
About 75 years old
Biggest decade
1950s
25.4% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
5.0%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
2,191
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1950s — 25.4% of all recorded uses (1,050).

Is Kathaleen 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 1952 (143)
Years since peak
73
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
49.9% average annual change
Best rank ever
#741
1952

Spellings of Kathaleen

Kathaleen is not the most common spelling — Kathleen is, with 95.2% against Kathaleen's 0.55%.

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 Kathaleen is used

Across 1910–2025, Kathaleen was most concentrated in Michigan — about 1 in 50,000 girls, against 1 in 104,672 across all states with data. It was least common in West Virginia (1 in —).

02 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Michigan1 in 50,000
  2. 2New York1 in 50,000
  3. 3Pennsylvania1 in 50,000
  4. 4California1 in 100,000
  5. 5Iowa1 in 100,000
  6. 6Illinois1 in 100,000
  7. 7Indiana1 in 100,000
  8. 8Massachusetts1 in 100,000

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. Kathaleen has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Kathaleen around the world

Where Kathaleen 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.

  • France
    1978–1980
    #2,291
    in 1980
  • Canada
    1991–1991
    #2,397
    in 1991
  • South Australia
    1947–1975
    #675
    in 1975

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques, Statistics Canada and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Notable people named Kathaleen

People whose public names include Kathaleen, backed by Wikidata given-name records and ordered by linked Wikimedia pages. The name may be a middle name.

People data from Wikidata (CC0). Fame is measured, not judged — the order reflects how widely each person is documented, not the U.S. birth records popularity this page is otherwise about.

Kathaleen in other languages

Cross-language forms and variants of Kathaleen. Linked forms have their own page here.

Kathleen

Variant forms from Wikidata (CC0). Most are used mainly outside the United States; U.S. birth records statistics cover US usage only.

Kathaleen 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
#741
1952
Peak year
1952
143 that year
First recorded
1902
Last recorded
2008
All-time count
4,136
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Kathaleen

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

KatheleenKathyleenKathreenKatharinaKatheryneKatherinKataleyaKatherinaKatherleenKaterinaKateleenKatalinaKatarinaKathlynKatleenKatherynKathrineKathleenKathleneKatharineKattaleyaKathryneKatelynneKatheen

Names with a curve like Kathaleen

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Kathaleen, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

LaureneHerlindaPhillisEvonVonnieErlindaKathernArnettaGeorgettaMickeyMaritaVernetta

Sibling names for Kathaleen

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 Kathaleen

Top names of 1952, Kathaleen's peak yearThe 1950s in fullOther names that peaked in 1952Girls' names starting with K