Carol
- Pronunciation
- [Ca-rol]
- Gender
- Female
- Meaning
- Joy
- Origin
- English
About the Name Carol
Carol derives from the Old French and medieval Latin tradition of names built on the Germanic root karl — meaning a free man or a strong man — the same root that gives us Charles and its many feminine forms. As a standalone English name Carol also absorbed associations with the word "carol" (a joyful song, particularly at Christmas), lending it a festive, melodic resonance that Charlotte and Caroline do not share. This double etymology — Germanic strength and English song — gave Carol a warmth unusual among names of its era.
The name appears in the SSA top-1000 from 1928 and peaked at #4 in 1941, accumulating more than 763,000 recorded top-1000 births across its nearly eight decades of chart presence. Among its notable bearers: Carol Burnett (born 1933) is an American actress, comedian, singer, and writer whose six-decade career has produced multiple defining 20th-century American TV variety-show roles — particularly her 11-year lead role as the host of a landmark American TV comedy-variety program. Dame Carol Ann Duffy (born 23 December 1955) is a Scottish poet who served as British Poet Laureate from 2009 to 2019, breaking three barriers in the 341-year history of that post as the first woman to hold it.
Carol last appeared in the SSA top-1000 in 2006, at rank #972, after a gradual half-century decline. It reads today as a warm mid-century classic, evoking the postwar American generation with a gentle ease. Given the breadth of its family tree, recorded variants are extensive: Carel, Carey, Cari, Carla, Carleen, Carlene, Carley, Carlin, Carlita, Carlota, Carlotta, Carly, Caro, Carola, Carolann, Carole, Carolina, Caroline, Carolyn, Carolynn, Carrie, Carrol, Carrola, Carroll, and many others listed in the broader Carol family.
Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.
Quick Facts About Carol
US Popularity History (1928–2006)
Annual US births named Carol by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 1946 with 34,283 girls named Carol (girl rank #5 that year).
Where it stands today: in 2006, ranked #972 for girls (270 US births). That's 967 places below its 1946 peak.
Source: US Social Security Administration. Limitations: US birth-certificate data only; names appearing fewer than 5 times in a given year are suppressed for privacy; spelling variants are counted separately. For names that ranked outside the US top 100 before year 2000, only the years they reached the top 100 are shown — the chart may have gaps for less-popular historical names.
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Variant Forms
| Name | Meaning | Gender | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|
| Carel | Strong | Male | French |
| Carey | The Dark One | Female | Celtic |
| Cari | Flows Like Water | Female | Turkish |
| Carla | Manly | Female | Romanian |
| Carleen | Feminine Form Of Charles Manly | Female | Irish |
| Carlene | Female | English | |
| Carley | "A Free Person. A Feminine Form Of Charles, Also See Carla, Carol And Caroline." | Female | English |
| Carlin | Small Champion | Male | Gaelic |
| Carlita | Feminine Form Of Charles Manly | Female | Spanish |
| Carlota | Variant Of Charlotte Meaning Manly | Female | Spanish |
| Carlotta | Italian Form Of Charlotte (Manly) | Female | Italian |
| Carly | Little And Womanly. Alternate Spelling: Carlie. | Female | Latin |
| Caro | Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Carola | Joy | Female | Spanish |
| Carolann | Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Carole | Song Of Happiness: Joy. Feminine Of Carl. | Female | French |
| Carolina | Joy. Also Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Caroline | Feminine Of Carl: Joy: Song Of Happiness. Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Carolyn | Joy Also Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Carolynn | Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Carrie | Abbreviation Of Carol And Caroline From The Masculine Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Carrol | Champion | Male | Celtic |
| Carrola | Joy | Female | Spanish |
| Carroll | Champion | Male | Gaelic |
| Cary | From The Fortress | Male | Celtic |
| Caryl | Feminine Of Carl: Joy | Female | English |
| Charla | Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Charleen | Manly | Female | French |
| Charlena | Feminine Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | French |
| Charlene | Manly | Female | French |
| Charlotta | Feminine Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | French |
| Charlotte | Tiny And Feminine. Also Feminine Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | French |
| Charmain | One Of Cleopatra's Attendants In Shakespeare's Antony And Cleopatra Was Named Charmian. | Female | French |
| Charmaine | Variant Of Charles Manly. One Of Cleopatra's Attendants In Shakespeare's Antony And Cleopatra Was Named Charmian. | Female | French |
| Cheryl | Feminine Form Of Charles | Female | German |
| Ina | Unisexual Name Meaning "Illuminate; Light Up." | Female | Chamoru |
| Karel | Strong | Male | Dutch |
| Kari | Joyful Song | Female | French |
| Karla | Strong | Female | French |
| Karleen | Womanly: Strength. Feminine Of Karl. | Female | German |
| Karli | Covered With Snow | Female | Turkish |
| Karlie | Womanly: Strength. Feminine Of Karl. | Female | German |
| Karlina | Womanly: Strength. Feminine Of Karl. | Female | German |
| Karlotta | Tiny And Feminine | Female | French |
| Karol | Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
| Karolina | Feminine Form Of Karl (Manly) | Female | Hungarian |
| Lola | Feminine Form Of Carlos Manly: Abbreviation Of Dolores Full Of Sorrows. | Female | Spanish |
| Loleta | Feminine Form Of Carlos Manly | Female | Spanish |
| Lolita | Feminine Form Of Carlos Manly | Female | Spanish |
| Lotte | Masculine | Female | German |
| Sharlene | Feminine Variant Of Charles Meaning Manly | Female | English |
Famous People Named Carol
2 notable figures from history and culture who share the name Carol.
- Carol Ann Duffy is an award-winning British poet and children’s book writer.
- Carol Burnett — TV Show Host (1933)
Looking for names like Carol?
A dedicated page with 60+ related names — spelling variants, rhymes, alliterations, same-origin matches, and shared meaning concepts — lives at its own URL so each kind of similarity gets a deeper treatment than fits here.
Compare Carol to Other Popular Names
Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Carol against today's most popular girls-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).
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