Brina
Feminine · “the Severn”
Brina is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 1,369 girls against 5 boys since 1880.
English drops the front of a word when the front is unstressed. Andrew gives Drew, Isabella gives Bella, Anthony gives Tony, Elizabeth gives Beth. Sabrina gives Brina — and Sabrina began as a river.
How old is the name Brina?
Brina first appears in US birth records in 1947 — 78 years ago. The typical Brina alive today was born around 1996, making them about 29 years old. About 1,300 people named Brina are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Brina most popular?
Brina peaked in 1996, reaching #2229 nationally. Today it ranks #10917, 8,688 places below that high. See the whole 1996 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Sabrina to Brina
The story of Brina
The Romans called the Severn Sabrina, and by the twelfth century Geoffrey of Monmouth had supplied a story to explain the word: a girl drowned in the river and gave it her name. Milton took the story for Comus in 1634 and made Sabrina a water spirit who rises to help, which is where the name entered English as a name rather than a map label. Aphesis did the rest: unstressed opening syllables fall away in speech long before anyone writes the shorter form down. The other two Brinas came from elsewhere entirely — one from a Slovenian shrub, one from a Yiddish household name — and the spelling gives no way to tell which family a Brina belongs to.
Meaningscholars disagree
the Severn, or juniper
Three sources reach this spelling. Sabrina is the Roman name of the river Severn, and Brina is the beheaded form. Slovenian brina is the ordinary word for juniper and is given as a name in its own right. Yiddish Breine, anglicized as Bryna or Brina, is a separate name again. All three are documented and none is derived from the others.
How the name formed
- Sabrina
- Brina
Related forms: Brina · Breine · Sabrina
Pronouncing Brina
BREE-nah
Two syllables, stress on the first. BRY-nah, with the long i, is used in families who came to it through the Yiddish Bryna rather than through Sabrina.
Nicknames for Brina
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
- 1947
- Most girls named
- 199660 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2229reached in 1996
- Change vs 2024
- +33.3%8 in 2025, from 6
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.
Brina in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Brina in Slovenian — same name
- Breine in Yiddish — related form
- Sabrina in Italian — related form
Brinas among us
people named Brina are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 200,908 born in 2025 was named Brina
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Brina
- #10917
- Brina on the 2025 chart
- #932
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Brina went to 8 girls in 2025, but Brynna is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 28, which makes it the 932nd most-given girls’ name of the year — 9,985 places above the chart.
- Brynna20
- Brina8
About 1 girl in 57,402 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 200,908 for Brina 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 Sherica test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Brina's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Sherica climbed just as high around 1981, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Sherica's path sketches the road Brina is walking now.
Brina 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
Brina beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Brina in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Two syllables, five letters, and no ambiguity in any of them.
- Three unrelated traditions arrive at it, so it belongs comfortably in several kinds of family.
- It is already short, so there is nothing to shorten and nothing to explain.
- Most people will assume it is short for Sabrina and will ask.
- Bryna and Breena are both in use, so the spelling needs giving.
- The very small number of boys carrying this spelling will be read as girls on paper.
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What they receive
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Brina
Feminine · #10917 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Brinas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,300 people named Brina are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Brina?
- Brina is one of 2 recorded spellings. Brynna is the more common one — 20 births in 2025 against 8 for Brina.
- How popular is the name Brina in 2025?
- Brina ranks #10917 among US girl names in 2025, with 8 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Brina?
- About 1 in every 200,908 US girls born in 2025 was named Brina — 8 in all.
- Will my child share the name Brina with classmates?
- Brina will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Brina
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Edythe#10917 · Tessie#10917 · Drusilla#10917 · Eugenie#10917 · Ivah#10917 · Karri#10917 · Claribel#10917 · Myrtle#10917
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Brina? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Brina and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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