Who Americans think is cool

More Americans think they're at least somewhat cool than think they're not, a new YouGov poll finds.

We asked Americans a simple question: How cool do you think you are? 16% say they're very cool, 39% say they're somewhat cool, 24% say they're not very cool, and 12% say they're not at all cool. Overall, 56% of Americans say they're at least somewhat cool, while 35% say they're not that cool. 9% aren't sure if they're cool.

Younger adults are more likely to say they're cool than are older adults: 65% of adults under 30 say they're at least somewhat cool, compared to 62% of 30- to 44-year-olds, 52% of 45- to 64-year-olds, and 45% of those 65 and older.

Black Americans are especially likely to say they're cool: 79% say they're at least somewhat cool, compared to 65% of Hispanic Americans and 50% of white Americans. 35% of Black Americans say they're very cool, while only 20% of Hispanic Americans and 11% of white Americans say the same about themselves.

Parents are more likely than non-parents to say they're cool: 64% of those with kids under 18 say they're at least somewhat cool, compared to 54% of non-parents. This isn't just a function of age — people 65 and older are least likely of the four major age groups to say they're cool and least likely to be parents or guardians of children under 18. But within each of the three major age groups of adults younger than 65 —  those under 30, 30- to 44-year-olds, and 45- to 64-year-olds — parents of children under 18 are more likely than non-parents to describe themselves as cool.

Democrats and Republicans are about equally likely to describe themselves as cool: 59% of Democrats and 57% of Republicans say they're at least somewhat cool.

We also asked Americans how cool they think other people think they are. Slightly more Americans think they're at least somewhat cool (56%) than to think other people think they're at least somewhat cool (52%). There's a lot of overlap: 80% of those who say they're at least somewhat cool also think other people regard them that way.

Adults under 45 are more likely to think they're cool than to think others think they're cool. Older adults are more likely to think they're not very cool or not at all cool than to think others think they're uncool.

Too cool for school?

Across ages and racial groups, Americans are more likely to say they're cool now than to say they were cool in high school: 56% of U.S. adult citizens say they're at least somewhat cool now, and 43% say they were at least somewhat cool in high school. And this gap isn't just a product of people being less sure of their coolness a long time ago: Americans are about equally likely to say they're unsure of their coolness now as in high school. The gap in self-rated coolness between now and high school is small for those 65 and older (45% vs. 41%), but larger for younger adults who were in high school more recently: 65% of adults under 30 say they're cool now, while just 43% say they were cool in high school.

But how much does any of this matter? Many Americans insist they don't care about being cool. 42% profess the very cool position that being cool is not at all important to them, while 31% say being cool is not very important. Only 7% say being cool is very important, and 15% say it's somewhat important.

Americans who say they're cool are far more likely to say coolness is important than are those who say they're not cool. 51% of those who say they're very cool say coolness is at least somewhat important, compared to 30% of those who say they're somewhat cool, 5% of those who say they're not very cool, and 3% of those who say they're not at all cool.

But while most Americans insist they don't care about being cool, they're more likely to say people they know think being cool is important. While 22% say they find coolness at least somewhat important, 42% say people they know do. 74% of Americans say being cool isn't very or at all important, but only 44% think other people think that.

Both people who think they're cool and those who don't are more likely to perceive other people as caring about coolness than they do.

Which celebrities are cool?

We also asked Americans how cool they think 36 different famous people — actors, singers, athletes, politicians, and more — are. We selected our list to include younger and older figures in each group. (For convenience the word celebrities is being used loosely, encompassing politicians who might object to the label as well as groups of people such as bands.)

Of the 36, the celebrity Americans are most likely to say is cool is Samuel L. Jackson. More than 70% of Americans think Jackson is at least somewhat cool. The least cool figure of the 36 is Kanye West: 21% say he's at least somewhat cool, and 65% say he's not very cool or not at all cool.

Besides Jackson, other figures (or groups) who many Americans say are cool are the Beatles (72% very or somewhat cool), Michael Jordan (70%), Willie Nelson (67%), Clint Eastwood (65%), and Dwayne Johnson (63%).

Of the nine political figures on the list, only Barack Obama has more people say he was very or somewhat cool than that he is not very or not at all cool (55% vs. 34%). Almost all Democrats say Obama is cool (95%), as do 52% of Independents and 19% of Republicans.

The other eight political figures are all more likely to be seen as uncool than cool, including Bernie Sanders (37% cool vs. 48% uncool), Kamala Harris (36% vs. 53%), former Department of Government Efficiency head Elon Musk (33% vs. 56%), Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (31% vs. 39%), Zohran Mamdani (30% vs. 35%), JD Vance (28% vs. 56%), Donald Trump (27% vs. 67%), and West, a former presidential candidate (21% vs. 65%).

66% of Republicans say Trump is very or somewhat cool, as do 12% of Independents and 3% of Democrats.

Some of the figures asked about had considerable shares of Americans unsure whether or not they were cool, including Kendrick Lamar (34% unsure), Mamdani (34%), Sydney Sweeney (36%), Caitlin Clark (39%), Zendaya (42%), Sabrina Carpenter (42%), Timothée Chalamet (44%), Olivia Rodrigo (48%), the K-Pop group BTS (54%), and Shohei Ohtani (54%). All of those figures are in their 20s and 30s; the average celebrity on their list under 40 had 36% of Americans unsure as to their coolness, compared to an average of 15% unsure about those 40 and older.

Younger Americans are more likely than older people to rate many of the celebrities as cool. This includes some cases where younger and older people split over whether a celebrity is cool in the first place. For example, 56% of adults under 45 say Zendaya is cool, and only 16% say she's uncool — a net coolness of +40. Among those 45 and older, however, 23% say Zendaya is cool and 25% say uncool, a net of -2.

For eight of the names, older Americans are more likely to say they're cool. This includes several figures who are themselves old — Willie Nelson, the (surviving) Beatles, Clint Eastwood, and Bruce Springsteen — but also the younger figures Taylor Swift, Sydney Sweeney, and Travis Kelce, as well as Joe Rogan, age 58.

Who we think other people think is cool

But YouGov only asked half of our respondents about how cool they think celebrities are. We asked the randomly chosen other half of respondents a slightly different question: how cool they think the typical American thinks those celebrities are.

For some celebrities, there's little difference between what Americans think is cool and what they think others think is cool. For example, 72% of Americans say Samuel L. Jackson is at least somewhat cool, and 72% think other people think Jackson is at least that cool.

But for most of the celebrities asked about, Americans are more likely to think other people think the celebrities are cool than to consider the celebrities cool themselves.

For example, 40% of Americans say Travis Kelce is very or somewhat cool, and 36% say he's not very or not at all cool — a net coolness of +5. But 52% think the typical American thinks Kelce is cool and only 25% think others think he's uncool, for a net of +27. That's a 22-point gap between what Americans think and what they think others think, the largest of any of the 36 celebrities in the poll.

Other celebrities who Americans disproportionately think other Americans consider cool, relative to their own rating of the celebrities' coolness, include Sabrina Carpenter (an 18-point gap), Taylor Swift (17 points), Serena Williams (15 points), Beyoncé (15 points), Bad Bunny (15 points), and Michael Jordan (15 points).

On the other side, 67% of Americans say Willie Nelson is cool and 15% say he's uncool. That +51 net coolness is 7 points higher than the +44 net coolness Americans think other people attribute to Nelson, the largest gap in that direction of any celebrity in the poll.

Cool things

But wait, there's more! We didn't just ask Americans about which people they think are cool. We also gave them a list of 36 different things, from AI to golf to selfies to whisky, and asked them to rate how cool they are.

The results suggest the typical American is a bit of a square. The things Americans are most likely to call cool include science (87% say it's very or somewhat cool), outer space (83%), watching movies (82%), and reading books (81%). Meanwhile Americans are far less likely to say several edgier things are cool, including beer (45%), poker (44%), marijuana (35%), guns (33%), and betting on sports (25%).

Because we thought it would be cool, we included "online surveys" in the list of 36 things rated for coolness, and found that 74% say taking online surveys is cool. Since all respondents are people who voluntarily signed up to take YouGov's online surveys, we realize this particular finding probably isn't representative of all U.S. adult citizens.

Like with celebrities, there are some big differences between which things Americans say are cool and which things Americans think other Americans think is cool. For example, 87% of Americans say science is cool, but only 66% think others think it's cool. There are also large gaps for reading books (81% vs. 62%), classical music (72% vs. 44%), tea (65% vs. 52%), word games (64% vs. 52%), and math (59% vs. 39%).

On the flip side, there are many activities that Americans are less likely to consider cool than to think other people think are cool. This includes American football (59% say it's cool and 75% think others think it's cool), wine (54% vs. 68%), rap music (47% vs. 62%), marijuana (35% vs. 58%), and cryptocurrency (24% vs. 43%).

See the results of this poll

Methodology: The April 9 - 17, 2026 poll was conducted among 2,236 U.S. adult citizens. Respondents were selected from YouGov’s opt-in panel to be representative of U.S. adult citizens. A random sample (stratified by gender, age, race, education, geographic region, and voter registration) was selected from the 2019 American Community Survey. The sample was weighted according to gender, age, race, education, U.S. region, 2024 presidential vote, 2020 election turnout and presidential vote, baseline party identification, and current voter registration status. 2024 presidential vote, at time of weighting, was estimated to be 48% Harris and 50% Trump. Demographic weighting targets come from the 2019 American Community Survey. Baseline party identification is the respondent’s most recent answer given around November 8, 2024, and is weighted to the estimated distribution at that time (31% Democratic, 33% Republican). The margin of error for the overall sample is approximately 3%.

Image: Getty (Alrphoto)

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