Odell
An English name derived from the Old English elements "od" meaning wealth and "ell" meaning courage.
Name Census estimates that about 6,487 living Americans carry the first name Odell. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 78.2% of registrations being male. The average person named Odell today is around 63 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Odell births was 1922 (534 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Odell. 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 Odell with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
6.5K
~ 1 in 52,837 Americans
Peak year
1922
534 babies that year
Average age
63
years old
2024 SSA rank
#4,651
Tracked since 1883
Census
Odell in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 4,967 people with the first name Odell, which placed it at #3,933 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
#3,933
National first-name rank
People counted
5.0K
4,967 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.6
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
71.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Odell
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Odell is Black at 71.2%. The next largest groups are White (20.9%) and Two or More Races (3.2%). 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 Odell 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 Odell at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American71.2% · 3,538
- White20.9% · 1,038
- Two or more races3.2% · 159
- Hispanic or Latino3.0% · 149
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.2% · 61
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.4% · 22
Gender
Gender distribution for Odell
Odell is one of the more evenly split names in the SSA data. Of the 19,011 total registrations, 14,860 (78.2%) were male and 4,151 (21.8%) were female.
Odell as a male name
- Ranked #4,651 in 2024
- 22 male births in 2024
- Peak: 1922 (367 births)
Odell as a female name
- Ranked #17,769 in 2017
- 5 female births in 2017
- Peak: 1921 (171 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Odell leans strongly male. 4,314 people counted with this name were male (86.9%), compared with 652 female bearers (13.1%).
Popularity
Odell: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Odell from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1920s, with 4,405 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
Odell 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 Odell during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Odells live
The SSA's state-level files cover 26 states and territories. North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas recorded the most babies named Odell, while Wisconsin, Utah, New Jersey recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 523 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Odell
The name Odell is an English given name derived from the Old English words "od" meaning wealth or prosperity, and "hyll" meaning hill or mound. It likely originated in the Middle Ages, around the 11th or 12th century, as a surname describing someone who lived near a prosperous hill or mound.
One of the earliest known bearers of the name was Odell de Deyncourt, a Norman knight who was granted lands in Lincolnshire, England, in the late 11th century after the Norman Conquest of 1066. The name appears in several medieval English records and charters from that time period.
In the 13th century, an Odell of Maskbury was recorded as a landowner in Bedfordshire, England. Another notable historical figure with the name was Sir Odell Wilkinson, a 16th-century English soldier and Member of Parliament who fought in the Anglo-Spanish War during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I.
The name Odell has been used sporadically throughout history, but it gained more widespread popularity in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. One of the most famous individuals with the name was Odell Shepard, an American poet, and literary critic born in 1884 who wrote extensively about the works of Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau.
Other notable individuals with the name Odell include Odell Brewing Company founder Odell Oziers (1908-1999), American football player Odell Thurman (born 1983), and American baseball player Odell Hale (1927-2004). The name has also been used as a middle name, such as in the case of actor Odell Aughenbaugh (1886-1969) and American football coach Odell Thurman (1914-1998).
While the name Odell has roots in Old English, it has been used across various cultures and regions over the centuries, reflecting the diverse paths and influences that have shaped many given names throughout history.
People
Odell + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Odell 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
Odell: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Odell?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 6,487 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Odell 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 52,837 US residents.
Is Odell a common name?
We classify Odell as "Rare". It ranks above 97% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 19,011 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Odell most popular?
The single biggest year for Odell was 1922, when 534 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Odell is about 63 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Odell in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 4,967 people with the name Odell, or 1.64 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #3,933 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 Odell 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 Odell?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Odell leans strongly male. 4,314 people counted with this name were male (86.9%), compared with 652 female bearers (13.1%). 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 Odell?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Odell is Black at 71.2%. The next largest groups are White (20.9%) and Two or More Races (3.2%). 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 Odell most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Odell in the 2020 Census, accounting for 71.2% (3,538 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 Odell in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Odell a male name?
Yes, 78.2% of people registered as Odell 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 Odell still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Odell 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 Odell 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 called Odell?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.