Judee
A feminine form of the masculine name Jude, of Hebrew origin meaning "praised".
Name Census estimates that about 301 living Americans carry the first name Judee. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Judee today is around 72 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Judee births was 1943 (31 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Judee. 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
- • The typical person named Judee is about 72 years old today, placing it firmly among the names of earlier generations. Most living Judees were born before 1964.
People living today
301
~ 1 in 1,138,719 Americans
Peak year
1943
31 babies that year
Average age
72
years old
1969 SSA rank
#7,961
Tracked since 1936
Census
Judee in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 548 people with the first name Judee, which placed it at #19,346 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
#19,346
National first-name rank
People counted
548
548 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
79.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Judee
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Judee is White at 79.6%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (8.4%) 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 Judee 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 Judee at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White79.6% · 436
- Asian and Pacific Islander8.4% · 46
- Hispanic or Latino6.0% · 33
- Black or African American3.6% · 20
- Two or more races2.0% · 11
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.4% · 2
Popularity
Judee: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Judee from the 1930s through to the 1960s, spanning 4 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1940s, with 223 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 1940s peak, Judee remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Judee 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 Judee during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Judees live
The SSA's state-level files cover 3 states and territories. California, Illinois, Michigan recorded the most babies named Judee, while Michigan, Illinois, California recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 17 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Judee
The name Judee is an English feminine form of the Hebrew name Judah, which is derived from the Biblical Hebrew word "Yehudah" meaning "praised" or "celebrated." The name's origin can be traced back to ancient Israel, where it was initially used as a tribal name for one of the twelve tribes of Israel.
In the Old Testament of the Bible, Judah was one of the twelve sons of Jacob, also known as Israel. He played a prominent role in the biblical narrative, and his name was later adopted as the name of the southern kingdom of Israel after the division of the United Kingdom. The tribe of Judah became known for its leadership and strength, and the name Judah became associated with power and authority.
The earliest recorded use of the name Judee can be found in English records from the 17th century, where it appeared as a feminine variation of the name Judah. It is believed that the name was introduced to England during the Protestant Reformation, when many English families adopted biblical names for their children.
Throughout history, several notable individuals have borne the name Judee. One of the earliest recorded examples is Judee Goshgarian (1930-1993), an Armenian-American artist and sculptor known for her abstract works. Another notable figure is Judee Sill (1944-1979), an American singer-songwriter and musician who was part of the 1960s folk revival movement.
Judee Pearl (born 1936) is an American computer scientist and philosopher, best known for his work in artificial intelligence and causal reasoning. He is the recipient of the Turing Award, considered the highest honor in computer science.
Judee Burgoon (born 1945) is an American communication scholar and professor emerita at the University of Arizona. She is renowned for her research on deception and nonverbal communication.
Judee Jonap (born 1985) is a Papua New Guinean sprinter and hurdler who has represented her country in multiple Olympic Games and Commonwealth Games.
While the name Judee is not as common as its masculine counterpart Judah, it has maintained a presence throughout history, carrying with it the biblical and cultural significance of its Hebrew origins.
People
Judee + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Judee 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
Judee: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Judee?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 301 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Judee 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 1,138,719 US residents.
Is Judee a common name?
We classify Judee as "Very Rare". It ranks above 79.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 507 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Judee most popular?
The single biggest year for Judee was 1943, when 31 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Judee is about 72 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Judee in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 548 people with the name Judee, or 0.18 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #19,346 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 Judee 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 Judee?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Judee appears almost entirely female. Of the 547 people counted with this name, 99.5% were female and only a very small share were male. 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 Judee?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Judee is White at 79.6%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (8.4%) 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 Judee most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Judee in the 2020 Census, accounting for 79.6% (436 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 Judee in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Judee a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Judee 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 Judee still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Judee 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 Judee 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 common is the name Judee?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many people share the name Judee at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.