Jacqueline
- Pronunciation
- [Jac-que-line]
- Gender
- Female
- Meaning
- Feminine Form Of Jacques (Supplanter)
- Origin
- French
About the Name Jacqueline
Jacqueline is the French feminine form of Jacques, the French form of James — ultimately from the Hebrew Yaaqov (Jacob), meaning "supplanter" or "one who follows." The name has been used continuously in French-Catholic naming traditions for centuries.
The name's overwhelming modern cultural anchor is American First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy Onassis, 1929–1994, the wife of US President John F. Kennedy and First Lady 1961–1963 — anchoring the name in mid-20th-century American glamour and tragedy). After President Kennedy's 1963 assassination, Jacqueline Kennedy became one of the most-iconic American style figures of the 20th century. Other notable bearers include American baseball star Jackie Robinson (Jack Roosevelt Robinson, 1919–1972, the iconic African-American baseball player who broke the MLB color barrier in 1947); American figure skater Jacqueline Kennedy; and contemporary actress Jacqueline Bisset (born 1944).
Jacqueline held a US top-100 girls' rank from 1955 through 1985 — three decades of consistent American popularity, peaking around 1962 (the year following Kennedy's inauguration as First Lady) at #54. The name has receded since but remains in steady use, currently sitting in the US top 300 girls' rank. The name's appeal is its layered Hebrew-French-Catholic-American pedigree combined with three flowing syllables — the in-built Jacob-biblical register, the strong Jackie Kennedy mid-20th-century American glamour anchor, and the elegant French sophistication. Common nicknames Jackie (the dominant warm short form, casual and warm), Jacqui, Jaq, Jac, and the rare Lina each carry distinct registers; the alternate spellings Jacquelyn, Jaclyn, Jacqualine, and Jacquelyne have their own SSA tracking. International forms include Jacqueline (French original), Giacomina (Italian feminine of Giacomo), Jakub (Polish masculine), and the broader Jacob/James/Jacques family.
Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.
Quick Facts About Jacqueline
US Popularity History (1928–2025)
Annual US births named Jacqueline by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 1964 with 11,976 girls named Jacqueline (girl rank #37 that year).
Where it stands today: in 2025, ranked #558 for girls (541 US births). That's 521 places below its 1964 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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Where in the US Is Jacqueline Most Popular?
Average girl-name rank within each state across 2016–2025 SSA records. A lower number means the name appears closer to the top of that state's girls-name rankings — a per-capita measure that isn't biased toward large states. For Jacqueline the strongest states are Nevada, New Mexico, California.
Strongest girls-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Nevada | #235 | 91 |
| 2 | New Mexico | #252 | 38 |
| 3 | California | #272 | 1,394 |
| 4 | Idaho | #323 | 33 |
| 5 | Arizona | #333 | 204 |
| 6 | Texas | #351 | 960 |
| 7 | Massachusetts | #377 | 151 |
| 8 | Oregon | #380 | 84 |
| 9 | Connecticut | #394 | 63 |
| 10 | Washington | #411 | 168 |
Source: SSA state-level baby-name dataset 2016–2025. States with fewer than 3 years of data for Jacqueline in this window are excluded. Births < 5 in a given state-year are suppressed by SSA for privacy.
Variant Forms
| Name | Meaning | Gender | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jacalyn | Feminine Of Jacques Derived From James And Jacob. | Female | French |
| Jackie | God Has Been Gracious: Has Shown Favor. Based On John Or Jacques. Used More For Girls Than Boys. | Male | English |
| Jacky | God Has Been Gracious: Has Shown Favor. Based On John Or Jacques. | Male | Scottish |
| Jacqualine | Feminine Of Jacques Derived From James And Jacob. | Female | French |
| Jacqueleen | Feminine Of Jacques Derived From James And Jacob. | Female | French |
| Jacquelin | French Form Of Jacob | Male | French |
| Jacquelyn | Feminine Of Jacques Derived From James And Jacob. | Female | French |
Looking for names like Jacqueline?
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 Jacqueline to Other Popular Names
Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Jacqueline against today's most popular girls-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).