Orrie
A diminutive form of the English masculine name Orville meaning "from the golden town".
Name Census estimates that about 230 living Americans carry the first name Orrie. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 68.3% of registrations being male. The average person named Orrie today is around 66 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Orrie births was 1918 (34 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Orrie. 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 Orrie with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • The typical person named Orrie is about 66 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Orries were born before 1970.
People living today
230
~ 1 in 1,490,236 Americans
Peak year
1918
34 babies that year
Average age
66
years old
2007 SSA rank
#5,586
Tracked since 1880
Census
Orrie in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 397 people with the first name Orrie, which placed it at #24,319 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
#24,319
National first-name rank
People counted
397
397 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
67.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Orrie
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Orrie is White at 67.0%. The next largest groups are Black (25.2%) and American Indian/Alaska Native (3.3%). 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 Orrie 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 Orrie at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White67.0% · 266
- Black or African American25.2% · 100
- American Indian and Alaska Native3.3% · 13
- Two or more races1.8% · 7
- Hispanic or Latino1.5% · 6
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.3% · 5
Gender
Gender distribution for Orrie
Orrie is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 988 total registrations, 675 (68.3%) were male and 313 (31.7%) were female.
Orrie as a male name
- Ranked #11,973 in 2007
- 6 male births in 2007
- Peak: 1918 (23 births)
Orrie as a female name
- Ranked #5,586 in 1954
- 6 female births in 1954
- Peak: 1896 (13 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Orrie on both sides of the split. Of the 397 people counted with this name, 297 were male (74.8%) and 100 were female (25.2%).
Popularity
Orrie: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Orrie from the 1880s through to the 2000s, spanning 13 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 208 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
Orrie 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 Orrie during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Orries live
Origin
Meaning and history of Orrie
The name Orrie is believed to have originated from the Old English word "or," which means "to shine" or "to be bright." It's a diminutive form of the name Orrin, which itself is derived from the Old Norse name Ørrin, meaning "the honor-winner" or "the illustrious one."
Orrie was a popular name in England during the Middle Ages, particularly among the Anglo-Saxon nobility. It was often given to children born during the early hours of the morning when the sun was rising, symbolizing the start of a new day and the promise of a bright future.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Orrie can be found in the Domesday Book, a manuscript compiled in 1086 by order of William the Conqueror. The book mentions an individual named Orrie de Beaumont, a Norman nobleman who held lands in Hampshire.
In the 13th century, an English priest and scholar named Orrie of Huntingdon wrote a chronicle titled "Historia Anglorum" (History of the English People), which provided a detailed account of the early history of England from the Roman conquest to the reign of King Henry II.
During the Renaissance period, Orrie became a popular name among the wealthy merchant class in Italy. One notable figure was Orrie Borghese (1509-1572), a wealthy banker and patron of the arts who commissioned works from renowned artists such as Michelangelo and Raphael.
In the 17th century, Orrie Rembrandt van Rijn (1606-1669), the famous Dutch painter, was born in Leiden, Netherlands. He was known for his masterful use of light and shadow, which perhaps reflected the meaning of his first name.
Another notable figure with the name Orrie was Orrie Hume (1711-1776), a Scottish philosopher and historian who made significant contributions to the fields of epistemology, metaphysics, and political philosophy.
During the 19th century, Orrie Dickens (1812-1870), the renowned English novelist, was born in Portsmouth, England. His works, such as "Oliver Twist" and "A Tale of Two Cities," became literary classics and provided a vivid portrayal of Victorian society.
People
Orrie + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Orrie as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with O
Other first names starting with O with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Orrie: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Orrie?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 230 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Orrie 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 1,490,236 US residents.
Is Orrie a common name?
We classify Orrie as "Very Rare". It ranks above 76% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 988 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Orrie most popular?
The single biggest year for Orrie was 1918, when 34 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Orrie is about 66 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Orrie in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 397 people with the name Orrie, or 0.13 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #24,319 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 Orrie 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 Orrie?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Orrie on both sides of the split. Of the 397 people counted with this name, 297 were male (74.8%) and 100 were female (25.2%). 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 Orrie?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Orrie is White at 67.0%. The next largest groups are Black (25.2%) and American Indian/Alaska Native (3.3%). 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 Orrie most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Orrie in the 2020 Census, accounting for 67.0% (266 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 Orrie in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Orrie a male name?
Yes, 68.3% of people registered as Orrie in the SSA data are male. 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 Orrie still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Orrie 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 Orrie 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 are named Orrie?
Find out how many people share the name Orrie on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org — a quick modern estimate with the living-bearer count front and centre.