Honore
A French masculine name derived from the Latin "honorus", meaning honor.
Name Census estimates that about 77 living Americans carry the first name Honore. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 89.3% of registrations being female. The average person named Honore today is around 65 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Honore births was 1916 (14 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Honore. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
Key insights
- • Fewer than 100 living Americans are believed to carry the name Honore. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
77
~ 1 in 4,451,355 Americans
Peak year
1916
14 babies that year
Average age
65
years old
1974 SSA rank
#5,535
Tracked since 1898
Census
Honore in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 470 people with the first name Honore, which placed it at #21,552 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#21,552
National first-name rank
People counted
470
470 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
48.5% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Honore
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Honore is White at 48.5%. The next largest groups are Black (39.8%) and Hispanic (6.0%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Honore described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Honore at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White48.5% · 228
- Black or African American39.8% · 187
- Hispanic or Latino6.0% · 28
- Two or more races4.9% · 23
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.9% · 4
Gender
Gender distribution for Honore
Honore leans heavily female at 89.3% of total registrations, but 27 boys have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Honore as a male name
- Ranked #5,535 in 1974
- 5 male births in 1974
- Peak: 1920 (11 births)
Honore as a female name
- Ranked #17,210 in 2016
- 5 female births in 2016
- Peak: 1942 (11 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Honore on both sides of the split. Of the 470 people counted with this name, 230 were male (48.9%) and 240 were female (51.1%).
Popularity
Honore: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Honore from the 1890s through to the 2010s, spanning 11 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 70 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1920s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Honore by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Honore during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Honores live
Origin
Meaning and history of Honore
The name Honore originates from the French language and has its roots in the Latin word "honor," meaning "honor" or "dignity." This name gained prominence during the Middle Ages in France.
The name Honore has been associated with several notable historical figures. One of the earliest and most famous bearers of this name was Honoré de Balzac, a French novelist and playwright born in 1799 and died in 1850. He is renowned for his remarkable work "La Comédie Humaine," a sequence of short stories and novels depicting French society.
Another prominent figure with this name was Honoré Daumier, a French printmaker, caricaturist, painter, and sculptor, who lived from 1808 to 1879. He is best known for his satirical cartoons and drawings that criticized the political and social injustices of his time.
Honore de Marsay, a fictional character created by Honoré de Balzac, is also noteworthy. This aristocratic dandy appeared in several of Balzac's novels and represented the epitome of elegance and sophistication in French high society during the 19th century.
In the realm of religion, Saint Honoré (also known as Honoratus) was a 6th-century Bishop of Amiens in France. He is celebrated as the patron saint of bakers and confectioners due to his association with the traditional French bread, the "gâteau de Saint-Honoré."
Another notable figure was Honoré-Victorin Daumier, a 19th-century French painter and sculptor, known for his satirical works that often criticized the bourgeoisie and the political establishment of his time. He was born in 1808 and died in 1879.
The name Honore has a rich historical legacy, with its origins deeply rooted in the French language and culture. It has been borne by notable writers, artists, and religious figures, contributing to its enduring significance and recognition throughout history.
People
Honore + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Honore as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with H
Other first names starting with H with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Honore: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Honore?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 77 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Honore going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 4,451,355 US residents.
Is Honore a common name?
We classify Honore as "Very Rare". It ranks above 60.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 252 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Honore most popular?
The single biggest year for Honore was 1916, when 14 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Honore is about 65 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Honore in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 470 people with the name Honore, or 0.16 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #21,552 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Honore in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Honore?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Honore on both sides of the split. Of the 470 people counted with this name, 230 were male (48.9%) and 240 were female (51.1%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Honore?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Honore is White at 48.5%. The next largest groups are Black (39.8%) and Hispanic (6.0%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Honore most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Honore in the 2020 Census, accounting for 48.5% (228 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Honore in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Honore a female name?
Yes, 89.3% of people registered as Honore in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Honore still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Honore in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Honore can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many people have the name Honore?
For a quick modern take, check how many Americans are named Honore on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.