Name Awesome

Oprah

Girls' name

Neck, through Orpah

Oprah has been given to 99 babies in the U.S. since 1986. 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 1987, with 37 recorded.

Babies named Oprah, 2007

1 in 571,000

Oprah over time, 1880–2025

Girls
01020304018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Oprah: meaning, origin, and history

Neck, through Orpah

Hebrew

What Oprah means

Oprah belongs to the name family reached through Oprah → Orpah. Its meaning is “neck”.

Dictionary etymologyReferences, data & attribution

From Oprah Winfrey, a very influential talk show host, originally named Orpah after the Biblical figure, via metathesis.

Excerpt from Wiktionary: Oprah (English) · CC BY-SA 4.0

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Origin, language, and formation

Oprah is used in English. Its origins include Hebrew.

Oprah is a modern formation.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Orpah.

Pronunciation and spelling

In English, Oprah is pronounced /ˈəʊpɹə/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 99 girls were recorded with the name Oprah between 1986 and 2007. Its highest annual count was 37 in 1987; its best national rank was #2,698 in 1987.

How common is Oprah?

Oprah had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2007, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2007
1 in 571,000
7 of 3,997,748 births
Among girls only
1 in 275,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2007
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
395,862 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Oprah 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 2007 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 395,862 children born in 2007 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Oprah. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Oprahs were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Oprah was born before 1988 — so the typical Oprah is around 37 today.

Median birth year
1988
About 37 years old
Biggest decade
1980s
73.7% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
100.0%
A modern name
Recorded since 1950
99
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1980s — 73.7% of all recorded uses (73).

Is Oprah 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 1987 (37)
Years since peak
38
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
74.4% average annual change
Best rank ever
#2,698
1987

Spellings of Oprah

Oprah is not the most common spelling — Sarah is, with 86.0% against Oprah's <0.01%.

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 Oprah is used

Across 1910–2025, Oprah was most concentrated in Florida — about 1 in — girls, against 1 in 753,929 across all states with data. It was least common in Louisiana (1 in —).

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Florida1 in —
  2. 2Louisiana1 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. Oprah has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Oprah around the world

Where Oprah 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.

  • England & Wales
    1999–2014
    #5,691
    in 2014
  • France
    2005–2024
    #3,327
    in 2024
  • South Australia
    2013–2013
    #818
    in 2013

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

Oprah 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
#2,698
1987
Peak year
1987
37 that year
First recorded
1986
Last recorded
2007
All-time count
99
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Oprah

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

NarahZerahJyrahAzrahAirahNurahAyrahNyrahLyrahFerrahLarahInarahPharahUmrahAdarahCyrahVerahNourahEmirahJirahSurahAfrahNairahAzorah

Sibling names for Oprah

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 Oprah

Top names of 1987, Oprah's peak yearThe 1980s in fullOther names that peaked in 1987Girls' names starting with O