Kaelin
A feminine name of Old Irish origin meaning "slender".
Name Census estimates that about 3,579 living Americans carry the first name Kaelin. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 74.8% of registrations being female. The average person named Kaelin today is around 24 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Kaelin births was 1995 (281 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Kaelin. 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.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Kaelin with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
3.6K
~ 1 in 95,768 Americans
Peak year
1995
281 babies that year
Average age
24
years old
2023 SSA rank
#8,248
Tracked since 1981
Census
Kaelin in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 3,239 people with the first name Kaelin, which placed it at #5,336 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
#5,336
National first-name rank
People counted
3.2K
3,239 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
64.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Kaelin
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Kaelin is White at 64.0%. The next largest groups are Black (16.1%) and Two or More Races (8.2%). 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 Kaelin 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 Kaelin at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White64.0% · 2,074
- Black or African American16.1% · 520
- Two or more races8.2% · 264
- Hispanic or Latino7.6% · 245
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.4% · 110
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.8% · 26
Gender
Gender distribution for Kaelin
Kaelin is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 3,652 total registrations, 920 (25.2%) were male and 2,732 (74.8%) were female.
Kaelin as a male name
- Ranked #10,213 in 2023
- 7 male births in 2023
- Peak: 1995 (121 births)
Kaelin as a female name
- Ranked #8,248 in 2023
- 13 female births in 2023
- Peak: 2005 (196 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Kaelin on both sides of the split. Of the 3,237 people counted with this name, 740 were male (22.9%) and 2,497 were female (77.1%).
Popularity
Kaelin: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Kaelin from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 1,560 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
Kaelin 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 Kaelin during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Kaelins live
The SSA's state-level files cover 26 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Kaelin, while South Carolina, Oklahoma, Minnesota recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 49 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Kaelin
The name Kaelin is believed to have originated from the Scottish Gaelic and Irish Gaelic languages. It is thought to be derived from the Old Irish word 'caol' or 'caelan', which means 'slender' or 'thin'.
The name Kaelin has been in use since at least the 16th century in Scotland and Ireland. It was originally a masculine name but has become more commonly used as a feminine name in modern times.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Kaelin is found in the Annals of Ulster, an ancient Irish chronicle that covers events from the 5th to the 16th century. In this text, the name is spelled 'Caelán'.
In the 17th century, the name Kaelin appears in the Scottish Gaelic poetry of Alasdair MacMhaighstir Alasdair, a renowned Scottish poet and political activist.
One of the earliest known individuals to bear the name Kaelin was Caelán of Leinster, an Irish poet who lived in the 8th century. He is best known for his work 'The Poems of Caelán', which is considered a significant contribution to early Irish literature.
Another notable figure with the name Kaelin was Caelán Bán mac Buachaill, an Irish poet and historian who lived in the 15th century. He was a member of a prominent family of poets and is known for his work 'The Book of Caelán Bán'.
In the 19th century, Kaelin was the name of a character in the novel 'The Fair God' by Lew Wallace, published in 1873. The character was a Native American princess, which helped to popularize the name in the United States.
Other historical figures with the name Kaelin include Kaelin Deery (1892-1965), an Irish politician and member of the Irish Republican Army, and Kaelin Guédry (1912-1994), a French-Canadian soldier who served in World War II.
While the name Kaelin has been in use for centuries, it has become more widely known and popularized in recent times, particularly in the United States and other English-speaking countries.
People
Kaelin + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Kaelin as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with K
Other first names starting with K with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Kaelin: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Kaelin?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 3,579 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Kaelin 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 95,768 US residents.
Is Kaelin a common name?
We classify Kaelin as "Rare". It ranks above 95.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 3,652 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Kaelin most popular?
The single biggest year for Kaelin was 1995, when 281 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Kaelin is about 24 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Kaelin in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 3,239 people with the name Kaelin, or 1.07 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #5,336 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 Kaelin 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 Kaelin?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Kaelin on both sides of the split. Of the 3,237 people counted with this name, 740 were male (22.9%) and 2,497 were female (77.1%). 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 Kaelin?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Kaelin is White at 64.0%. The next largest groups are Black (16.1%) and Two or More Races (8.2%). 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 Kaelin most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Kaelin in the 2020 Census, accounting for 64.0% (2,074 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 Kaelin in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Kaelin a female name?
Yes, 74.8% of people registered as Kaelin 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 Kaelin still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Kaelin 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 Kaelin 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 Americans are named Kaelin?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.