Abi
Feminine · “Hebrew avigail”
Abi is given to both — 632 girls and 22 boys since 1880. See other names given to both
Abigail was the English word for a lady's maid for two hundred years. The biblical Abigail calls herself a handmaid several times, playwrights took the name for a servant character, and by 1700 an abigail was an ordinary noun that needed no explanation.
How old is the name Abi?
Abi first appears in US birth records in 1973 — 52 years ago. The typical Abi alive today was born around 2007, making them about 18 years old. About 600 people named Abi are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Abi most popular?
Abi peaked in 1981, reaching #4963 nationally. Today it ranks #9457, 4,494 places below that high. See the whole 1981 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Avigayil to Abi
The story of Abi
In 1 Samuel 25 Abigail intercepts David on his way to slaughter her husband's household, brings supplies, argues him out of it in a long and skillful speech, and repeatedly calls herself his handmaid. That last detail did the damage. Beaumont and Fletcher gave the name to a waiting-woman in The Scornful Lady in 1616, other dramatists followed, and Abigail became the standard stage name for a lady's maid. Abigail Hill, later Lady Masham, was Queen Anne's bedchamber woman and rival to the Duchess of Marlborough, which reinforced it further. By the eighteenth century abigail was a common noun in ordinary English prose and Swift, Fielding and Smollett all use it. The name went out of use for two centuries partly as a result, and only came back in the twentieth.
Meaning
Hebrew avigail, my father is joy
Abi is a short form of Abigail, Hebrew Avigayil, generally read as my father is joy or my father rejoices. She appears in 1 Samuel as the wife of Nabal and later of David, and is one of the few women in the Hebrew Bible presented as unambiguously clever. The peak of the short form is 1981.
How the name formed
- Avigayil
- Abigail
- Abi
Related forms: Abby · Avigail
Pronouncing Abi
AB-ee
Two syllables, stress on the first. Abi, Abby and Abbie are homophones; the single-b spelling is commoner in Britain.
Nicknames for Abi
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
- 1973
- Most girls named
- 201627 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #4963reached in 1981
- Change vs 2024
- −47.4%10 in 2025, from 19
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.
Abi in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Abby in English — spelling variant
- Avigail in Hebrew — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas.
Abis among us
people named Abi are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 160,727 born in 2025 was named Abi
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Abi
- #9457
- Abi on the 2025 chart
- #584
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Abi went to 10 girls in 2025, but Abby, Aby and Abbi are the same name said out loud. Together the 4 spellings went to 408, which makes it the 584th most-given girls’ name of the year — 8,873 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 3,939 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 160,727 for Abi itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Mical test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Abi's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Mical climbed just as high around 1946, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Mical's path sketches the road Abi is walking now.
Abi sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Abi beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Abi in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Abigail is available as the formal version.
- Three letters and two syllables, as compact as a name gets.
- The biblical figure is one of the more admirable in the book.
- Abby is the commoner American spelling.
- It reads as a short form rather than a full name.
- The single b invites a long first vowel from some readers.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Abi
Feminine · #9457 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Abis are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 600 people named Abi are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Abi?
- Abi is one of 4 recorded spellings. Abby is the more common one — 379 births in 2025 against 10 for Abi.
- How popular is the name Abi in 2025?
- Abi ranks #9457 among US girl names in 2025, with 10 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Abi?
- About 1 in every 160,727 US girls born in 2025 was named Abi — 10 in all.
- Will my child share the name Abi with classmates?
- Abi will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Abi
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Leta#9457 · Inga#9457 · Delphia#9457 · Cammie#9457 · Lisandra#9457 · Amee#9457 · Venecia#9457 · Annetta#9457
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Abi? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Abi and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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