Aneesa
Feminine · “Arabic anisa”
Arabic derives the word for a human being and the word for friendliness from one root. From a-n-s come ins, humankind, and uns, sociability, so a person is by definition the sociable creature. The jinn are named from the opposite idea, janna, to conceal, so they are the hidden ones and we are the visible companions.
How old is the name Aneesa?
Aneesa first appears in US birth records in 1967 — 58 years ago. The typical Aneesa alive today was born around 2004, making them about 21 years old. About 1,600 people named Aneesa are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Aneesa most popular?
Aneesa peaked in 2002, reaching #1247 nationally. Today it ranks #8860, 7,613 places below that high. See the whole 2002 chart.
Where it comes from
From anisa to Aneesa
The story of Aneesa
The pairing of ins and jinn runs through Arabic and the Quran addresses them together repeatedly, as the two orders of created beings with free will. Ins is humankind, from the root about sociability and visibility; jinn is from a root meaning to cover or conceal, which also gives janna, a garden, because of its covering foliage, and majnun, mad, meaning covered or possessed. So the vocabulary sets the two kinds of being against each other by their relation to sight and to company: humans are the ones you can see and be with, jinn the ones you cannot. That is a piece of language rather than of doctrine, and it shows a system deriving an anthropology from a root. English has nothing comparable: our word human is from Latin humus, earth, and says something entirely different about what a person is.
Meaning
Arabic anisa, friendly or companionable
From the Arabic root a-n-s, associated with familiarity, sociability and human company, giving ins, humankind, uns, friendliness, and the adjective anis with its feminine anisa. The spelling with a doubled e is the South Asian romanisation of the long vowel; Arabic-studies convention writes Anisa. It peaks in the American data in 2002.
How the name formed
- anisa
- Aneesa
Related forms: Anisa · Aneesa · Enise
Pronouncing Aneesa
ah-NEE-sah
Three syllables, stress on the second, long second vowel. The doubled e marks that length in the South Asian system. The initial vowel carries a glottal stop in Arabic that English omits.
Nicknames for Aneesa
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
- 1967
- Most girls named
- 2002159 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1247reached in 2002
- Change vs 2024
- −50.0%11 in 2025, from 22
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.
Aneesa in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Anisa in Arabic — transliteration
- Aneesa in Urdu — same name
- Enise in Turkish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas.
Aneesas among us
people named Aneesa are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 146,115 born in 2025 was named Aneesa
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Aneesa
- #8860
- Aneesa on the 2025 chart
- #944
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Aneesa went to 11 girls in 2025, but Anesa is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 16, which makes it the 944th most-given girls’ name of the year — 7,916 places above the chart.
- Aneesa11
- Anesa5
About 1 girl in 100,454 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 146,115 for Aneesa 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 Misha test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Aneesa's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Misha climbed just as high around 1972, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Misha's path sketches the road Aneesa is walking now.
Aneesa 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
Aneesa beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Aneesa in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is settled and warm.
- Nisa and Ani are two usable short forms.
- The sound is easy for English speakers.
- Anisa is the spelling used in most reference works.
- It is easily confused with Anissa and Aneesah.
- It is rare outside Muslim communities in the United States.
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Aneesa
Feminine · #8860 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Aneesas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,600 people named Aneesa are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Aneesa?
- Aneesa is the most-used spelling in US records — 11 of the 16 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Anesa.
- How popular is the name Aneesa in 2025?
- Aneesa ranks #8860 among US girl names in 2025, with 11 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Aneesa?
- About 1 in every 146,115 US girls born in 2025 was named Aneesa — 11 in all.
- Will my child share the name Aneesa with classmates?
- Aneesa will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Aneesa
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Lida#8860 · Lauretta#8860 · Dot#8860 · Bonita#8860 · Benita#8860 · Trixie#8860 · Adna#8860 · Sue#8860
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Aneesa? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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