Jodene
Feminine
Jodene is two letters and an ending. Jo is one of the shortest names in English, serving Josephine, Joan and Joanna at once; the rest of this name is a suffix that turns it into something long enough to write on a certificate. The whole thing was assembled in America and has no life anywhere else.
How old is the name Jodene?
Jodene first appears in US birth records in 1937 — 88 years ago. The typical Jodene alive today was born around 1962, making them about 63 years old. About 800 people named Jodene are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Jodene most popular?
Jodene peaked in 1966, reaching #1568 nationally. See the whole 1966 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Jo serves as a short form for Josephine, Joan and Joanna alike to Jodene
The story of Jodene
Jody has one documented American life that has nothing to do with any of that. In military cadence — the call-and-response chants that keep a formation in step — Jody is the name of the man who stayed at home. He has your car, he has your girl, he is not marching in the rain: the whole point of the figure is that he is the civilian life the marchers left behind, and the chants that carry him are known as Jody calls for that reason. The tradition is well documented across the American services from the second war onward, and it made the name familiar to a very large number of people in a very specific way. Whether any family chose the name because of it is not recorded, and probably not — but Jody was in the air, which is how most names travel.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Everything depends on which Jo is at the front, and the record does not say. Josephine gives a Hebrew sentence about another child; Joan and Joanna give a different Hebrew name entirely; Jody may be its own thing again. The ending has no content — it is a shape borrowed from other women's names of the period rather than a meaningful element. So the name cannot be translated, and a family that wants a meaning for it will have to choose the parent name themselves.
How the name formed
- Jo serves as a short form for Josephine, Joan and Joanna alike
- Jody becomes a name in American use for both sexes
- Military cadences make Jody the man left at home
- American parents attach a long ending, producing Jodene
Related forms: Jodine · Jodean · Jody
Pronouncing Jodene
joh-DEEN
Two syllables with the stress at the end. JOH-deen, with the weight at the front, is also heard and sounds noticeably more like a compound of two names than a single one.
Nicknames for Jodene
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
- 1937
- Most girls named
- 196651 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1568reached in 1966
- Change vs 1983
- 0.0%5 in 1989, 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.
Jodene in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Jodine in English — spelling variant
- Jodean in English — spelling variant
- Jody in English — related form
Jodenes among us
people named Jodene 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
Jodene 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
- Short, phonetic and easy to say on first sight
- Contains one of the most portable short forms in English
- Distinctive without asking anything difficult of anyone
- The ending is written -dene, -dine or -dean by different families, so the spelling will not survive being taken down by ear.
- No meaning attaches to the name as a whole, only to whichever Jo a family has in mind.
- It is closely dated to a mid-century American fashion and will be heard that way.
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Jodene
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Jodenes are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 800 people named Jodene are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Jodene in 2025?
- Jodene is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Jodene with classmates?
- Jodene will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More J names
The most-given names starting with J, all years combined.
Jennifer#586 · Jessica#665 · Janet#2778 · Julie#872 · Joyce#1071 · Joan#1085 · Julia#131 · Jean#2117
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Jodene? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Jodene and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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