Darya
Feminine · “he who holds firm the good”
Darya is two names at once: the Russian form of Daria, from a Persian throne name, and the Persian word for the sea. Both are Iranian in origin and they are not the same word.
How old is the name Darya?
Darya first appears in US birth records in 1961 — 64 years ago. The typical Darya alive today was born around 2009, making them about 16 years old. About 1,300 people named Darya are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Darya most popular?
Darya peaked in 2024, reaching #3277 nationally. Today it ranks #3517, 240 places below that high. See the whole 2024 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Darayavaush to Darya
The story of Darya
Darius ruled the Achaemenid empire and his name reached Europe through the Greek historians; its feminine Daria was borne by an early martyr and spread through the Orthodox and Catholic worlds alike. Russian made Darya, one of its most-used women's names for centuries. Persian meanwhile kept darya as the ordinary word for a sea, and Iranian families use it as a name on that meaning. American records hold both.
Meaningscholars disagree
he who holds firm the good, or the sea
Russian Darya descends from Greek Dareios, itself the Old Persian throne name Darayavaush, built on elements meaning to hold and good. Separately, modern Persian darya means the sea, and Darya is used in Iran on that reading. Both trace to Iranian languages and neither derives from the other.
How the name formed
- Darayavaush
- Daria
- Darya
Related forms: Дарья · Daria · Darya · Daria
Pronouncing Darya
DAR-yah
Two syllables, first stressed, in Russian. Persian gives dar-YAA, with the stress at the end.
Nicknames for Darya
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
- 1961
- Most girls named
- 200750 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #3277reached in 2024
- Change vs 2024
- −10.4%43 in 2025, from 48
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.
Darya in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Дарья in Russian — transliteration
- Daria in Italian — same name
- Darya in Persian — related form
- Daria in Polish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, New York, Virginia.
Daryas among us
people named Darya are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 37,378 born in 2025 was named Darya
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Darya
- #3517
- Darya on the 2025 chart
- #726
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Darya went to 43 girls in 2025, but Daria, Dariyah and Dariah and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 6 spellings went to 236, which makes it the 726th most-given girls’ name of the year — 2,791 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 6,810 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 37,378 for Darya 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 Ricardo test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Darya's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Ricardo climbed just as high around 1986, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Ricardo's path sketches the road Darya is walking now.
Darya 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 Darya is headed
Darya should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
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.
Darya beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Darya in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Two documented Iranian origins, both of them good — a king's title and the sea.
- Dasha is a warm short form with a very long Russian history.
- Five letters and two syllables, easy to write.
- The stress differs between the Russian and Persian readings.
- Daria, Darya and Dariya are all in use and relatives may prefer different ones.
- Dasha needs explaining to anyone outside a Russian-speaking family.
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What they receive
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Darya
Feminine · #3517 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Daryas 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 Darya are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Darya?
- Darya is one of 6 recorded spellings. Daria is the more common one — 107 births in 2025 against 43 for Darya.
- How popular is the name Darya in 2025?
- Darya ranks #3517 among US girl names in 2025, with 43 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Darya?
- About 1 in every 37,378 US girls born in 2025 was named Darya — 43 in all.
- Will my child share the name Darya with classmates?
- Darya will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Darya
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Maida#3517 · Amada#3517 · Afton#3517 · Allura#3517 · Jaina#3517 · Hallee#3517 · Katara#3517 · Joella#3517
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Darya? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Darya and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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