Danica
Feminine · “morning star”
Danica is the morning star. In the Slavic languages it is the ordinary word for Venus seen at dawn, and it is a genuine name across the whole region.
How old is the name Danica?
Danica first appears in US birth records in 1916 — 109 years ago. The typical Danica alive today was born around 2007, making them about 18 years old. About 16,500 people named Danica are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Danica most popular?
Danica peaked in 2007, reaching #307 nationally. Today it ranks #1631, 1,324 places below that high. See the whole 2007 chart.
Where it comes from
From danica to Danica
The story of Danica
Danica is an ordinary given name across the South and West Slavic languages, and it appears in folk poetry as a personification of the morning star. Slavic emigration brought it to America, where it stayed rare until the late twentieth century. It rose sharply in the 1990s and again in the 2000s, when a racing driver of the name became widely known.
Meaning
morning star
From the Slavic danica, 'morning star' — the planet Venus in its dawn appearance — built on a root meaning 'day'. It is a real word in Serbian, Croatian, Slovene and Slovak, and the name is used across all of them. The meaning is transparent to speakers.
How the name formed
- danica
- Danica
Related forms: Даница · Danica · Danica · Danica
Pronouncing Danica
DAN-ih-kuh
Three syllables, stress on the first, in American use. Slavic languages say DAH-nee-tsa with a ts.
Nicknames for Danica
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
- 1916
- Most girls named
- 20071,109 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #307reached in 2007
- Change vs 2024
- −7.3%127 in 2025, from 137
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.
Danica in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Даница in Serbian — transliteration
- Danica in Croatian — same name
- Danica in Slovene — same name
- Danica in Slovak — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Pennsylvania.
Danicas among us
people named Danica are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 12,656 born in 2025 was named Danica
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Danica
- #1631
- Danica on the 2025 chart
- #764
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Danica went to 127 girls in 2025, but Danika is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 196, which makes it the 764th most-given girls’ name of the year — 867 places above the chart.
- Danica127
- Danika69
About 1 girl in 8,200 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 12,656 for Danica 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 Chandra test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Danica's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Chandra climbed just as high around 1975, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Chandra's path sketches the road Danica is walking now.
Danica 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 Danica is headed
Danica is easing off slowly — about 20% 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.
Danica beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Danica in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The morning-star meaning is concrete, vivid and completely transparent to Slavic speakers.
- It is a living name across four Slavic languages.
- Dani is a ready-made short form with an independent record.
- The Slavic c is a ts sound, which English does not reproduce.
- It is often assumed to be a feminine of Daniel, which it is not.
- It is closely dated to the 2000s in American records.
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What they receive
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Danica
Feminine · #1631 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Danicas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 16,500 people named Danica are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Danica?
- Danica is the most-used spelling in US records — 127 of the 196 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Danika.
- How popular is the name Danica in 2025?
- Danica ranks #1631 among US girl names in 2025, with 127 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Danica?
- About 1 in every 12,656 US girls born in 2025 was named Danica — 127 in all.
- Will my child share the name Danica with classmates?
- Danica will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Danica
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Irina#1631 · Kenley#1631 · Brisa#1631 · Elanor#1631 · Yael#1631 · Mika#1631 · Itzayana#1631 · Arlene#1631
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Danica? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Danica and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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