Kourtney
Masculine · “French Courtenay”
Kourtney is given to both — 840 boys and 13,925 girls since 1880. See Kourtney as a girl nameSee other names given to both
You can watch Courtney change sex in the data, decade by decade. It is a boys' name through the 1950s, roughly even in the late 1960s, and by 1980 it is overwhelmingly female. The male peak for the K spelling in 1985 is a late survival on the far side of that crossing, and the crossing never reversed.
How old is the name Kourtney?
Kourtney first appears in US birth records in 1971 — 54 years ago. The typical Kourtney alive today was born around 1991, making them about 34 years old. About 800 people named Kourtney are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Kourtney most popular?
Kourtney peaked in 1985, reaching #1724 nationally. Today it ranks #8243, 6,519 places below that high. See the whole 1985 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Courtenay to Kourtney
The story of Kourtney
The one-way movement of names from male to female is one of the most reliable patterns in American naming, and Courtney documents it cleanly. The mechanism is usually described as a preference cascade: a name given to a few girls becomes slightly less attractive for boys, which increases the female share, which reduces the male share further. It compounds quickly, and it does not run backwards, because a name that reads as female cannot easily be given to a boy without comment. Ashley, Leslie, Shannon, Whitney, Aubrey, Kelly and Carol all made the same crossing in the twentieth century and none returned. What Courtney adds is timing: the whole transition takes about twenty-five years, which is roughly one generation, and the male tail persists for another decade after the crossing is complete.
Meaningscholars disagree
French Courtenay, a place name
From the Norman place name Courtenay, itself probably from a Gallo-Roman personal name Curtenus with a locative ending. The Courtenay family was substantial in medieval England and France. A folk etymology deriving it from court nez, short nose, circulated in the Middle Ages and is not supported. Kourtney is an American respelling with a K. It peaks for boys in 1985.
How the name formed
- Courtenay
- Courtney
- Kourtney
Related forms: Courtney · Courtenay
Pronouncing Kourtney
KORT-nee
Two syllables, stress on the first. Identical to Courtney; the K changes nothing audible. The French Courtenay is koor-tuh-NAY with three syllables and the stress at the end.
Nicknames for Kourtney
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
- 1971
- Most boys named
- 199036 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1724reached in 1985
- Change vs 2024
- +50.0%9 in 2025, from 6
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.
Kourtney in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Courtney in English — spelling variant
- Courtenay in French — related form
Kourtneys among us
people named Kourtney are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 189,786 born in 2025 was named Kourtney
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Kourtney
- #8243
- Kourtney on the 2025 chart
- #881
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Kourtney went to 9 boys in 2025, but Courtney is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 47, which makes it the 881st most-given boys’ name of the year — 7,362 places above the chart.
- Courtney38
- Kourtney9
About 1 boy in 36,342 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 189,786 for Kourtney itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Lynell test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Kourtney's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Lynell climbed just as high around 1958, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Lynell's path sketches the road Kourtney is walking now.
Kourtney sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Kourtney beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Kourtney in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The K spelling is visually distinct from a very common name.
- Court works as a short form.
- It has a documented male history in the United States.
- It is read as female in every American context.
- Courtney with a C is far more common in both sexes.
- The medieval short nose etymology is not supported.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Kourtney
Masculine · #8243 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Kourtneys 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 Kourtney are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Kourtney?
- Kourtney is one of 2 recorded spellings. Courtney is the more common one — 38 births in 2025 against 9 for Kourtney.
- How popular is the name Kourtney in 2025?
- Kourtney ranks #8243 among US boy names in 2025, with 9 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Kourtney?
- About 1 in every 189,786 US boys born in 2025 was named Kourtney — 9 in all.
- Will my child share the name Kourtney with classmates?
- Kourtney will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Kourtney
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Danial#8243 · Ogden#8243 · Aaren#8243 · Trinity#8243 · Maury#8243 · Lindon#8243 · Ashford#8243 · Elbert#8243
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Kourtney? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Kourtney and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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