Breanna
Feminine
Breanna is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 82,375 girls against 65 boys since 1880.
Breanna is a feminine of Brian, built the American way — and Brian is a name most of the world knows because of a high king who died winning the battle that broke Norse power in Ireland.
How old is the name Breanna?
Breanna first appears in US birth records in 1965 — 60 years ago. The typical Breanna alive today was born around 1998, making them about 27 years old. About 81,000 people named Breanna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Breanna most popular?
Breanna peaked in 1996, reaching #74 nationally. Today it ranks #2542, 2,468 places below that high. See the whole 1996 chart.
Breanna appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From Brian to Breanna
The story of Breanna
Brian Boru was high king of Ireland and died at Clontarf in 1014, and his name has never gone out of Irish use since. It became extremely common in twentieth-century America, and feminines followed in the usual way — Brianna, Breanna, Brianne, Bryanna. Breanna rose through the 1980s and peaked in the mid-1990s, when the whole family was near its height.
Meaningscholars disagree
Not established
Brian's origin is not settled. The most-repeated readings connect it to a Celtic element bre, 'hill' — hence 'high' or 'noble' — or to bri, 'esteem' or 'worth'. Both are reconstructions. The -anna ending is an English feminine addition and carries no meaning of its own.
How the name formed
- Brian
- Brianna
- Breanna
Related forms: Brian · Brianna · Briana
Pronouncing Breanna
bree-AN-uh
Three syllables, stress in the middle. Breanna and Brianna are said identically; only the spelling differs.
Nicknames for Breanna
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
- 1965
- Most girls named
- 19964,701 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #74reached in 1996
- Change vs 2024
- −37.3%69 in 2025, from 110
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.
Breanna in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Brian in Irish — related form
- Brianna in English — spelling variant
- Briana in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida.
Breannas among us
people named Breanna are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 23,294 born in 2025 was named Breanna
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Breanna
- #2542
- Breanna on the 2025 chart
- #878
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Breanna went to 69 girls in 2025, but Breana is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 82, which makes it the 878th most-given girls’ name of the year — 1,664 places above the chart.
- Breanna69
- Breana13
About 1 girl in 19,601 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 23,294 for Breanna 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 Rosemary test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Breanna's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Rosemary climbed just as high around 1946, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Rosemary's path sketches the road Breanna is walking now.
Breanna 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
Where Breanna is headed
Breanna is easing off slowly — about 22% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
Medium confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Breanna beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Breanna in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Brian behind it has a documented royal history and continuous Irish use for a thousand years.
- Bree and Anna are both available and are very different in feel.
- Three syllables with a strong middle, a rhythm that carries well.
- Brianna is commoner and the two spellings are constantly confused.
- Brian's own meaning is genuinely unrecovered.
- It is closely dated to the 1990s in American records.
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What they receive
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Breanna
Feminine · #2542 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Breannas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 81,000 people named Breanna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Breanna?
- Breanna is the most-used spelling in US records — 69 of the 82 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Breana.
- How popular is the name Breanna in 2025?
- Breanna ranks #2542 among US girl names in 2025, with 69 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Breanna?
- About 1 in every 23,294 US girls born in 2025 was named Breanna — 69 in all.
- Will my child share the name Breanna with classmates?
- Breanna will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Breanna
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Taelyn#2542 · Lennie#2542 · Atarah#2542 · Alaysha#2542 · Ania#2542 · Lynn#2542 · Eliyana#2542 · Primrose#2542
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Breanna? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Breanna and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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