Katlin
Feminine
Katlin is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 5,335 girls against 126 boys since 1880.
Katlin is the shortest spelling of a name that has more than a dozen. Caitlin came to Ireland from French, English misread it, and the misreading generated Katelyn, Caitlyn, Kaitlin, Katelin and a good many more. This one drops the e from the middle, which leaves six letters doing the work of eight.
How old is the name Katlin?
Katlin first appears in US birth records in 1981 — 44 years ago. The typical Katlin alive today was born around 1995, making them about 30 years old. About 5,300 people named Katlin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Katlin most popular?
Katlin peaked in 1993, reaching #602 nationally. See the whole 1993 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Aikaterine to Katlin
The story of Katlin
Irish spelling assigns its own values to letters, and Caitlin is said KOYT-leen there. English speakers meeting it on paper produced KATE-lin instead, and that misreading is now the standard American pronunciation — which means the whole family of English spellings exists to write down a mistake. Katlin goes further than most by removing the vowel that made the mistake possible in the first place: without the e there is no Kate at the front, only Kat, which is arguably closer to what the name does in the mouth.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Caitlin is the Irish form of Cateline, the Old French version of Catherine, whose origin has never been established. The pure reading came from a resemblance to a Greek word and was attached centuries after the name existed. So the name's route is documented at every step and its destination is a blank, which is the honest thing to report rather than repeating the tidier answer.
How the name formed
- Aikaterine
- Cateline
- Caitlín
- Katlin
Related forms: Caitlín · Cateline
Pronouncing Katlin
KAT-lin
KAT-lin, two syllables, stress at the front, the first vowel short. Katelin and Katelyn are usually given a longer first vowel, KATE-lin, so this spelling genuinely says something slightly different rather than merely looking different.
Nicknames for Katlin
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
- 1981
- Most girls named
- 1993385 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #602reached in 1993
- Change vs 2014
- −42.9%8 in 2015, from 14
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.
Katlin in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Caitlín in Irish — same name
- Cateline in French — related form
Katlins among us
people named Katlin 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
Katlin 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
- Six letters for two syllables, which is short by the standards of this name family.
- Kat is a ready short form that the longer spellings hide.
- It works for either child, which the record confirms.
- More than a dozen spellings of this sound are in American use and none is standard.
- The first vowel is shorter here than in the common spellings, so the name is corrected in both directions.
- It is closely tied to one American generation and dates a person fairly precisely.
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Katlin
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Katlins are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 5,300 people named Katlin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Katlin in 2025?
- Katlin is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Katlin with classmates?
- Katlin will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More K names
The most-given names starting with K, all years combined.
Karen#1279 · Kimberly#302 · Kathleen#1150 · Katherine#186 · Kelly#851 · Kathryn#729 · Kayla#364 · Kathy#3249
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Katlin? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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