How popular is the name Karen? Karen fell 60% after it became a meme
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The 2020 census counted 880,756 women named Karen in the United States, making it the 10th most common female name among living Americans. Social Security records show 175 girls given the name in 2025, ranking it 1,281st.
Karen peaked in 1957, when 40,591 girls received it and it ranked fifth. It reached its best ranking, third, in 1965. It stayed in the top 100 girls' names every year from 1938 through 1986.
| Year | Girls named Karen | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 1940 | 7,283 | 34 |
| 1950 | 24,132 | 12 |
| 1957 | 40,591 | 5 |
| 1965 | 32,869 | 3 |
| 1975 | 8,168 | 27 |
| 1990 | 2,716 | 120 |
| 2010 | 1,288 | 248 |
| 2019 | 440 | 662 |
| 2021 | 229 | 1,088 |
| 2025 | 175 | 1,281 |
Most living Karens were born between the late 1940s and the early 1970s, which puts the typical Karen in her fifties to seventies. The 1990 census counted 1,658,895 of them. By 2020 that had fallen to 880,756, a drop of 47 percent.
Did the meme change anything?
The name was already in a long decline when "Karen" became a meme and slang for a demanding, entitled middle-aged woman, a usage that spread widely online around 2018 to 2020. Did this accelerate fewer girls being named Karen?
The clearest test is to compare Karen with names that peaked in the same era and were declining for the same generational reasons. Between 2019 and 2025, births dropped sharply for Karen and much less for its peers.
| Name | Peak year | Births 2019 | Births 2025 | Change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Karen | 1957 | 440 | 175 | -60% |
| Pamela | 1954 | 146 | 82 | -44% |
| Brenda | 1957 | 236 | 139 | -41% |
| Cynthia | 1957 | 378 | 247 | -35% |
| Linda | 1947 | 362 | 294 | -19% |
| Donna | 1959 | 116 | 98 | -16% |
| Susan | 1955 | 245 | 222 | -9% |
| Deborah | 1954 | 296 | 313 | +6% |
Karen fell 60 percent over those six years. Cynthia and Brenda, which peaked in exactly the same year, fell 35 and 41 percent. Linda and Susan fell less than 20 percent, and Deborah rose. Karen started 2019 as the most-given name in the group, ahead of Cynthia, Linda, and Deborah, and finished 2025 behind all three.
The sharpest single-year drop came between 2020 and 2021, when births fell 31 percent, from 332 to 229. In 2021 Karen dropped out of the top 1,000 girls' names for the first time since 1927.
The comparison has limits. Births of a few hundred move around year to year, and a name's decline can accelerate for reasons unrelated to any single event. The size of the gap between Karen and its closest peers is still hard to explain without the meme.
Where the Karens are
Among living women, Karen ranks highest in Hawaii, where it is sixth, followed by the District of Columbia at seventh. It ranks eighth in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Ohio. Illinois has the largest number among the top-ranked states, at 61,295, and Ohio has 60,539.
Across all years from 1880 to 2025, Social Security recorded 987,989 girls named Karen. The census also counted 1,820 men named Karen in 2020.
We looked at the name Claude the same way. The most common names among all living Americans are in the most common first names in America, and any name can be looked up on the names page.
Sources
Annual birth counts and ranks are from the Social Security Administration's national baby names file, 1880 through 2025, which lists names given to at least five babies of one sex in a year. Counts of living people are from the U.S. Census Bureau's 1990 and 2020 first-name tabulations. State ranks and counts are from the Census Bureau's 2020 state-level first-name tabulation. The timing of the slang usage is described in general terms; the Social Security figures do not measure its cause.
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How many people are named Karen?
The 2020 census counted 880,756 women named Karen in the United States, the 10th most common female name among living Americans. That is down from 1,658,895 in the 1990 census. The census also counted 1,820 men named Karen.
When was the name Karen most popular?
Karen peaked in 1957, when 40,591 girls received the name and it ranked fifth, according to Social Security records. It reached its highest ranking, third, in 1965, and stayed in the top 100 from 1938 through 1986. Most living Karens were born between the late 1940s and early 1970s.
Did the Karen meme make the name less popular?
The data suggests it sped up an existing decline. Births of the name fell 60 percent between 2019 and 2025, while Cynthia and Brenda, which peaked the same year, fell 35 and 41 percent and Linda fell 19 percent. Karen dropped out of the top 1,000 girls' names in 2021 for the first time since 1927.
