Jaquelyn
A feminine name of French origin meaning "supplanter" or "one who follows".
Name Census estimates that about 2,631 living Americans carry the first name Jaquelyn. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Jaquelyn today is around 27 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Jaquelyn births was 2000 (127 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Jaquelyn. 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.
People living today
2.6K
~ 1 in 130,275 Americans
Peak year
2000
127 babies that year
Average age
27
years old
2024 SSA rank
#7,734
Tracked since 1944
Popularity
Jaquelyn: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Jaquelyn from the 1940s through to the 2020s, spanning 9 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 1,027 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Jaquelyn 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 Jaquelyn during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Jaquelyns live
The SSA's state-level files cover 11 states and territories. California, Texas, Illinois recorded the most babies named Jaquelyn, while Washington, Pennsylvania, Ohio recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 118 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Jaquelyn
The name Jaquelyn is a feminine form of the masculine name Jacques, which originated from the Hebrew name Jacob. Jacob was a biblical patriarch whose name means "supplanter" or "one who follows". The name Jacques first gained popularity in France during the Middle Ages.
The spelling Jaquelyn emerged as an English variation of the French name Jacqueline. It is believed to have first appeared in England during the 13th century when the Norman French language was widely spoken among the nobility after the Norman conquest of England in 1066. The name may have derived from the Old French phrase "jaque de lin", meaning "jacket of linen".
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Jaquelyn was in a 14th-century English legal document. However, the name did not become widely used until the 16th and 17th centuries when it was associated with the French royal family. During this time, several prominent women bore the name, including Jacqueline of Bavaria, the Countess of Hainaut and Holland, who lived from 1401 to 1436.
Another notable figure with the name Jaquelyn was Jacqueline of Hainaut, the Queen of France from 1328 to 1348. She was born in 1312 and played a significant role in the Hundred Years' War between England and France. Jacqueline of Luxembourg, Countess of Holland and Hainaut, who lived from 1415 to 1472, was also a prominent figure in her time.
In literature, one of the earliest references to the name Jaquelyn can be found in the 16th-century play "The Taming of the Shrew" by William Shakespeare. The character Jacqueline is mentioned briefly in the play. The name also appears in the works of other notable English authors, such as Sir Walter Scott and Charles Dickens.
Throughout history, several women have borne the name Jaquelyn, including Jaquelyn Maugere, a 12th-century French nun and mystic; Jaquelyn of Settesoli, an Italian aristocrat and writer in the 15th century; and Jaquelyn Cochran, an American aviator and one of the first women to break the sound barrier, who lived from 1910 to 1980.
People
Jaquelyn + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Jaquelyn as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with J
Other first names starting with J with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Jaquelyn: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Jaquelyn?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,631 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Jaquelyn 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 130,275 US residents.
Is Jaquelyn a common name?
We classify Jaquelyn as "Rare". It ranks above 94.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,736 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Jaquelyn most popular?
The single biggest year for Jaquelyn was 2000, when 127 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Jaquelyn is about 27 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Jaquelyn a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Jaquelyn 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.
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.