Yvonne
Masculine · “Yew tree”
Yvonne is given to girls far more often — 156,119 girls against 619 boys since 1880. See Yvonne as a girl name
Yvonne is the French feminine of Yves, a name built on the yew tree, and it was one of the steadiest American girls' names of the mid-twentieth century. Two Yvonnes stand out: a general's wife who kept her calm under gunfire, and a rocket scientist whose obituary started a national argument.
How old is the name Yvonne?
Yvonne first appears in US birth records in 1921 — 104 years ago. The typical Yvonne alive today was born around 1957, making them about 68 years old. About 400 people named Yvonne are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Yvonne most popular?
Yvonne peaked in 1938, reaching #1741 nationally. See the whole 1938 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Yves to Yvonne
The story of Yvonne
In August 1962 gunmen of the OAS riddled Charles de Gaulle's car with bullets at Petit-Clamart outside Paris; Yvonne de Gaulle was in the back seat beside him, and the story goes that her first concern afterward was whether the chickens in the boot had survived. Yvonne Brill, a rocket scientist, invented a thruster that kept communications satellites in orbit; when she died in 2013, the New York Times obituary began with her beef stroganoff, readers protested, and the paper rewrote the opening. The name was a common American girls' name for much of the century; the spelling is recorded for a handful of boys, but it is a girl's name in every tradition behind it.
Meaning
Yew tree, feminine of Yves
Yves comes from a Germanic word for the yew, the wood of bows; Yvonne is its French feminine.
How the name formed
- Yves
- Yvonne
Related forms: Yvonne · Yvette · Evonne
Pronouncing Yvonne
ih-VON
Two syllables with the stress on the second.
Nicknames for Yvonne
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
- 1921
- Most boys named
- 196917 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1741reached in 1938
- Change vs 1989
- −54.5%5 in 1990, from 11
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.
Yvonne in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Yvonne in French — same name
- Yvette in French — related form
- Evonne in English — spelling variant
Yvonnes among us
people named Yvonne 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
Yvonne 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
- Instantly recognized and easy to say.
- A settled meaning with a French pedigree.
- A long American history.
- It is strongly represented among older generations and rare among babies, so a young Yvonne will stand out.
- People may spell it Evonne.
- For a boy it would be very unusual.
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What they receive
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Yvonne
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Yvonnes 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 Yvonne are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Yvonne in 2025?
- Yvonne is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Yvonne with classmates?
- Yvonne will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More Y names
The most-given names starting with Y, all years combined.
Yahir#814 · Yusuf#449 · Yosef#663 · Yehuda#740 · Yousef#744 · Yisroel#824 · Yaakov#1024 · Yitzchok#910
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Yvonne? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Yvonne and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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