Dina
Feminine · Hebrew roots · “judged" or "vindicated”
Dina is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 32,021 girls against 76 boys since 1880.
Dina has been spelled this way for a very long time: it is the form the Latin Bible gave to Jacob's daughter, and from there it settled into Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish and Scandinavian use without the English h. Two syllables, an open first vowel, nothing in it that snags. It reached American records by more than one road, and has held a modest, unbroken place ever since.
How old is the name Dina?
Dina first appears in US birth records in 1883 — 142 years ago. The typical Dina alive today was born around 1971, making them about 54 years old. About 29,000 people named Dina are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Dina most popular?
Dina peaked in 1969, reaching #199 nationally. Today it ranks #1326, 1,127 places below that high. See the whole 1969 chart.
Dina appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From Dīnāh (Hebrew) to Dina
The story of Dina
The oldest thread runs through Hebrew, where Dīnāh is the daughter of Jacob and Leah in Genesis. Latin translators dropped the final h, and it was that shorter shape — Dina — that traveled into Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Polish, Russian and the Scandinavian languages, while English-language Bibles kept Dinah. A second, quite separate thread comes from long names ending in -dina, which European families shortened at the dinner table until the short form stood alone as a given name. A third is Arabic: Dina is well established across Arabic-speaking communities, which is part of why American use has always been strongest in and around New York, New Jersey and California, where those communities are large.
Meaningscholars disagree
"judged" or "vindicated", from the Hebrew root din
The Hebrew name Dīnāh, from the root din (to judge), is generally read as "judged" or "vindicated". But the same four letters arrive by other roads: Dina also stands as a clipped form of longer European names ending in -dina — Bernardina, Claudina, Ondina, Geraldina — where it carries no meaning of its own, and it is an established name in Arabic-speaking countries with its own tradition behind it. Which reading applies depends on which family you are standing in.
How the name formed
- DīnāhHebrew
- DinaLatin
- DinahEnglish
- Dina
Related forms: Dinah · Dina · دينا (Dina) · Дина (Dina) · Dina · Dina
Pronouncing Dina
DEE-nuh
DEE-nuh is the usual American pronunciation. Some families, following English Dinah, say DY-nuh, so a spelling that looks obvious on paper still gets asked about aloud.
Nicknames for Dina
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
- 1883
- Most girls named
- 19691,572 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #199reached in 1969
- Change vs 2022
- −17.6%168 in 2025, from 204
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.
Dina in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Dinah in English — spelling variant
- Dina in Italian — same name
- دينا (Dina) in Arabic — transliteration
- Дина (Dina) in Russian — transliteration
- Dina in Norwegian — same name
- Dina in Spanish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: New York, New Jersey, California.
Dinas among us
people named Dina are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 9,567 born in 2025 was named Dina
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Dina
- #1326
- Dina on the 2025 chart
- #758
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Dina went to 168 girls in 2025, but Dinah is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 202, which makes it the 758th most-given girls’ name of the year — 568 places above the chart.
- Dina168
- Dinah34
About 1 girl in 7,957 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 9,567 for Dina 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 Sondra test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Dina's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Sondra climbed just as high around 1940, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Sondra's path sketches the road Dina is walking now.
Dina 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 Dina is headed
Dina should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High 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.
Dina beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Dina in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Four letters, two syllables, and no silent letters — once the first vowel is known, nobody has to spell it twice.
- The same spelling is native to Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Scandinavian, Russian and Arabic, so it travels without being adjusted.
- A documented record stretching back to the Hebrew Bible and the Latin translation of it, which is about as long an unbroken line as a name can have.
- Short enough that it needs no nickname, but Dee and Didi are there in real use if one is wanted.
- The DEE-nuh / DY-nuh split is real and will come up. So will the neighboring spellings — Dinah, Deena, Dena — which means occasional correcting of forms and email addresses, though never a name anyone finds hard to say.
- In Genesis, chapter 34, Dinah's story is a violent one. Most people will not have it in mind, but readers who know the text well may.
- Living bearers are concentrated in older generations, so a child named Dina today is likelier to meet adults with the name than classmates — and, on current numbers, would very probably be the only one in her school.
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What they receive
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Dina
Feminine · Hebrew roots · #1326 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Dinas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 29,000 people named Dina are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Dina?
- Dina is the most-used spelling in US records — 168 of the 202 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Dinah.
- How popular is the name Dina in 2025?
- Dina ranks #1326 among US girl names in 2025, with 168 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Dina?
- About 1 in every 9,567 US girls born in 2025 was named Dina — 168 in all.
- Will my child share the name Dina with classmates?
- Dina will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Dina
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Farrah#1326 · Madden#1326 · Madisyn#1326 · Jhene#1326 · Cara#1326 · Safiya#1326 · Janie#1326 · Emberlyn#1318
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Dina? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Dina and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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