Geena
Feminine
Geena is Gina with an e, and one performer is responsible for most of the spelling's circulation. She was born with a different first name entirely, went by a short form of it as a child, and changed one letter of that short form as an adult because she preferred how it looked. The letter she changed is the one English cannot make its mind up about.
How old is the name Geena?
Geena first appears in US birth records in 1956 — 69 years ago. The typical Geena alive today was born around 1995, making them about 30 years old. About 1,500 people named Geena are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Geena most popular?
Geena peaked in 1994, reaching #1100 nationally. See the whole 1994 chart.
Where it comes from
From Gina as a short form of several longer names to Geena
The story of Geena
The letter g is the least reliable consonant in English. Before a, o and u it is hard, as in game; before e and i it is usually soft, as in gem, except when it is not, as in get, give, girl and gift, all of which are common words that break the rule. The rule comes from French, the exceptions are mostly native English or Norse words that predate it, and English never reconciled them. Italian, which handed the pattern over, is entirely consistent about it: ge and gi are always soft, and if you want a hard g before those vowels you insert an h, which is why Italian has ghetto and spaghetti. So the same two letters at the front of a name are unambiguous in one language and a coin toss in the other, and this spelling inherits the ambiguity without solving it.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Several possible parents. It may be cut from Regina, from Georgina, from Eugenia or from an Italian name ending the same way, and each of those carries a different meaning. American families used all of them. The spelling does not record which, and a confident reading printed for this name has picked one candidate and left the others out.
How the name formed
- Gina as a short form of several longer names
- The g before e ambiguous in English and fixed in Italian
- One performer adopting the e spelling
- Geena in circulation for a decade or so
Related forms: Gina
Pronouncing Geena
JEE-nuh
Two syllables, stress on the first, with a soft g. The e in this spelling is doing exactly that job: it signals the soft reading, which the i spelling also does, so the two are identical in speech.
Nicknames for Geena
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
- 1956
- Most girls named
- 1994163 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1100reached in 1994
- Change vs 2016
- +14.3%8 in 2017, from 7
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.
Geena in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Gina in Italian — spelling variant
Geenas among us
people named Geena are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Geena sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- It is short, bright and unambiguous once heard.
- The e spelling makes the soft g slightly more certain than the i spelling does.
- It has a visible modern bearer who chose the spelling deliberately.
- Gina is far commoner and this spelling will be converted into it constantly.
- There is no single parent name and therefore no single meaning to give.
- It is closely tied to one decade of American visibility.
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Geena
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Geenas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,500 people named Geena are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Geena in 2025?
- Geena is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Geena with classmates?
- Geena will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More G names
The most-given names starting with G, all years combined.
Grace#38 · Gloria#654 · Gladys#3211 · Geraldine#2438 · Gail#8362 · Gertrude#6546 · Georgia#99 · Gina#2076
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Geena? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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