Collen
Feminine
Collen is given to both — 512 girls and 661 boys since 1880. See Collen as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Collen could be a French diminutive respelled or an Irish word shortened, and the record holds it for sons a little more often than daughters. The mountaineering term its first syllable spells is a piece of anatomy applied to a landscape.
How old is the name Collen?
Collen first appears in US birth records in 1918 — 107 years ago. The typical Collen alive today was born around 1973, making them about 52 years old. About 400 people named Collen are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Collen most popular?
Collen peaked in 1967, reaching #2781 nationally. See the whole 1967 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
Our story of Collen
A col is a neck. The mountaineering word for the lowest point on a ridge between two peaks is French, from the Latin collum, the neck — and the picture is exact, since a col is the narrow dip between two heads. The same Latin word gives collar, a thing worn on the neck; décolleté, meaning cut away from it; accolade, which was originally an embrace round the neck given when conferring knighthood; and the culinary collar of bacon. The mountain sense came into English through Alpine climbing in the nineteenth century, along with a whole vocabulary — arête, couloir, crevasse, serac, bergschrund — borrowed from the French and German guides who had the words first because they had the terrain.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Colin is a French diminutive of Nicholas; colleen is the Irish word for a girl, which English borrowed and American families used as a name. The two are unrelated and this spelling sits between them.
Pronouncing Collen
KOL-un
Two syllables with the stress at the front. Families who read it as the Irish word say kol-EEN with the weight at the back, which is a different name.
Nicknames for Collen
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1918
- Most girls named
- 196720 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2781reached in 1967
- Change vs 2000
- 0.0%5 in 2003, from 5
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Collens among us
people named Collen are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Collen sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- Both halves detach as short forms and neither sounds like the other.
- It works for a child of either sex, which the record confirms.
- Six letters with no silent ones make it simple to spell aloud.
- Colin, Colleen and Collin will all be written for it.
- The two possible readings stress it differently, so it is said two ways.
- Which of them applies to a given family is not recorded.
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Collen
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Collens are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 400 people named Collen are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Collen in 2025?
- Collen is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Collen with classmates?
- Collen will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More C names
The most-given names starting with C, all years combined.
Carol#2239 · Cynthia#1013 · Catherine#313 · Christine#1272 · Carolyn#1222 · Christina#770 · Charlotte#2 · Cheryl#4352
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Collen? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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