Odie
Feminine · “wealth”
Odie is given to both — 1,589 girls and 2,623 boys since 1880. See Odie as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Odie is a pet form of the large family of Germanic names beginning with a single element that meant inherited wealth. That element is everywhere in the old name stock and almost invisible now, because the word it came from died out in English entirely. It is also, since the late nineteen seventies, the name of a cartoon dog, which is most of what has happened to it since.
How old is the name Odie?
Odie first appears in US birth records in 1881 — 144 years ago. The typical Odie alive today was born around 1918, making them about 107 years old. About 200 people named Odie are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Odie most popular?
Odie peaked in 1883, reaching #499 nationally. See the whole 1883 chart.
Where it comes from
From A Germanic element meaning inherited wealth to Odie
The story of Odie
The word for inherited wealth was one of the most productive elements in Germanic naming, and it has vanished so completely from English that nobody hearing these names has any sense of it. It survives in a handful of places: in the name of a Norse god if you accept one etymology, in a few English words about property that arrived by other routes, and otherwise only inside names. That is a common fate for name elements. They stop being words, keep being names, and end up as sounds that families choose for reasons that have nothing to do with what they once meant. The modern chapter is shorter and clearer. A comic strip introduced a slow-witted beagle at the end of the nineteen seventies, the strip became one of the most widely syndicated in the world, and the name has been the dog's ever since.
Meaningscholars disagree
wealth, inheritance
The Germanic element behind the family means wealth or property, specifically the kind that is inherited rather than earned, and it opens Otto, Odell, Odilia and a long list of others. Which of those a particular Odie was short for is generally unrecoverable, and some were built on names from other stocks entirely. The element is settled; the parentage of any individual name is not.
How the name formed
- A Germanic element meaning inherited wealth
- Otto, Odell and a long family of names built on it
- Odie as an American pet form and then a full name
- A cartoon dog taking the name from the late nineteen seventies
Related forms: Otto · Ottone
Pronouncing Odie
OH-dee
Two syllables, stress on the first, with a long o. It is said exactly as it looks, and it has been spelled Odey and Ody in older records without any change in sound.
Nicknames for Odie
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
- 1881
- Most girls named
- 191656 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #499reached in 1883
- Change vs 1960
- −14.3%6 in 1963, from 7
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.
Odie in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Otto in German — related form
- Ottone in Italian — related form
Odies among us
people named Odie 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
Odie 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
- It is short, warm and impossible to mispronounce or misspell.
- It works on the register for either child, and the record shows it doing so.
- It carries a genuine and very old Germanic element, which almost no name of this shape does.
- A very famous cartoon dog has the name, and small children will make the connection immediately.
- It reads as a nickname, and people will ask what it is short for when the answer is nothing.
- It is strongly of the nineteenth century in American records and has not returned.
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What they receive
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Odie
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Odies are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 200 people named Odie are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Odie in 2025?
- Odie is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Odie with classmates?
- Odie will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More O names
The most-given names starting with O, all years combined.
Olivia#1 · Opal#423 · Olive#197 · Olga#3167 · Ollie#2276 · Ora#3712 · Ola#7885 · Ophelia#264
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Odie? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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