Raynelle
A feminine name of Scottish origin meaning "ray of the sun".
Name Census estimates that about 189 living Americans carry the first name Raynelle. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Raynelle today is around 51 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Raynelle births was 1980 (21 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Raynelle. 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.
People living today
189
~ 1 in 1,813,515 Americans
Peak year
1980
21 babies that year
Average age
51
years old
2002 SSA rank
#17,502
Tracked since 1937
Census
Raynelle in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 290 people with the first name Raynelle, which placed it at #30,183 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
#30,183
National first-name rank
People counted
290
290 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
41.4% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Raynelle
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Raynelle is White at 41.4%. The next largest groups are Black (41.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (6.2%). 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 Raynelle 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 Raynelle at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White41.4% · 120
- Black or African American41.4% · 120
- Asian and Pacific Islander6.2% · 18
- Two or more races4.8% · 14
- Hispanic or Latino3.4% · 10
- American Indian and Alaska Native2.8% · 8
Popularity
Raynelle: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Raynelle from the 1930s through to the 2000s, spanning 8 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 64 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1980s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Raynelle 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 Raynelle during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Raynelles live
Origin
Meaning and history of Raynelle
Raynelle is an English given name derived from the combination of the Germanic elements "ragin" meaning "counsel" and "hild" meaning "battle". It likely emerged as a variant of the more common name Ragnhild during the Middle Ages in regions where Old English and Old Norse intersected, such as parts of England that were subject to Norse settlement and rule.
The earliest recorded usage of Raynelle dates back to the 13th century, appearing in a handful of parish records and census rolls from northern England and southern Scotland. However, the name remained relatively obscure until the late 19th century when it experienced a modest rise in popularity, particularly among English-speaking Protestant communities in North America and the British Isles.
One of the earliest notable bearers of the name was Raynelle Barclay (1568-1638), a Scottish noblewoman and landowner from Fife who played a minor role in the political and religious turmoil of the Scottish Reformation. Another early figure was Raynelle Hawkins (1632-1705), an English Puritan minister and author from Gloucestershire.
In the 18th century, Raynelle Whitefield (1714-1771) was a Welsh philanthropist and supporter of the Methodist movement led by George Whitefield. A century later, Raynelle Smythe (1828-1901) was an Irish-born Canadian educator and advocate for women's rights who helped establish some of the earliest schools for girls in Ontario.
The 20th century saw a few more prominent individuals named Raynelle, including the American civil rights activist Raynelle Bullock (1923-2005) and the British novelist Raynelle Cartwright (1944-2018), though the name never achieved widespread popularity during this period.
People
Raynelle + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Raynelle as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with R
Other first names starting with R with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Raynelle: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Raynelle?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 189 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Raynelle 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 1,813,515 US residents.
Is Raynelle a common name?
We classify Raynelle as "Very Rare". It ranks above 73.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 226 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Raynelle most popular?
The single biggest year for Raynelle was 1980, when 21 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Raynelle is about 51 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Raynelle in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 290 people with the name Raynelle, or 0.10 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #30,183 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 Raynelle 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 Raynelle?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Raynelle leans strongly female. 276 people counted with this name were female (93.6%), compared with 19 male bearers (6.4%). 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 Raynelle?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Raynelle is White at 41.4%. The next largest groups are Black (41.4%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (6.2%). 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 Raynelle most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Raynelle in the 2020 Census, accounting for 41.4% (120 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 Raynelle in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Raynelle a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Raynelle 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 Raynelle still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Raynelle 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 Raynelle 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 Raynelle?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.