Hadassah
Feminine · Hebrew roots · “Myrtle (the tree)”
Hadassah is the Hebrew name given in the Book of Esther to the girl who becomes queen — "Hadassah, that is, Esther" — and it means the myrtle, an evergreen shrub with white flowers that Jewish tradition binds into the festival bundle at Sukkot. It has four syllables that fall in an easy wave, with the weight in the middle, and it has been read aloud in synagogues every Purim for well over two thousand years.
How old is the name Hadassah?
Hadassah first appears in US birth records in 1910 — 115 years ago. The typical Hadassah is a kid of about 9 — this name's wave is very recent. About 9,200 people named Hadassah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Hadassah most popular?
Hadassah peaked in 2024, reaching #530 nationally. Today it ranks #569, 39 places below that high. See the whole 2024 chart.
Hadassah appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From hadas (Hebrew, myrtle) to Hadassah
The story of Hadassah
The name appears once in the Hebrew Bible, in Esther 2:7, where the heroine is introduced by her Hebrew name Hadassah before the Persian court name Esther takes over the story. Latin tradition carried the verse forward as Edissa in the Vulgate, while Hebrew and Yiddish speakers kept Hadassah in living use as a given name. In 1912 Henrietta Szold founded the American women's Zionist organization Hadassah, which went on to build the Hadassah Medical Center in Jerusalem, and that gave the name a second public life in the United States. Its use as a baby name here is far more recent than its history suggests — the wave belongs to children rather than to grandparents.
Meaning
Myrtle (the tree)
From Hebrew hadas, the myrtle — one of the four species carried at Sukkot.
How the name formed
- hadasHebrew, myrtle
- Hadassah
- EdissaLatin Vulgate
Related forms: הֲדַסָּה · Hadas · Edissa · Hadasa · Hadassa
Pronouncing Hadassah
huh-DAH-suh
Hebrew speakers place a fuller stress on the last syllable: hah-dah-SAH. American English usually settles on the middle syllable, and some families say HAD-uh-suh. All three are in genuine use, so it is worth deciding early which one you will correct people toward.
Nicknames for Hadassah
High
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
- 1910
- Most girls named
- 2025529 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #530reached in 2024
- Change vs 2023
- +8.4%529 in 2025, from 488
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.
Hadassah in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- הֲדַסָּה in Hebrew — transliteration
- Hadas in Modern Hebrew — related form
- Edissa in Latin (Vulgate) — related form
- Hadasa in Spanish — spelling variant
- Hadassa in French — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: New York, Florida, New Jersey.
Hadassahs among us
people named Hadassah are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 3,038 born in 2025 was named Hadassah
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Hadassah
- #569
- Hadassah on the 2025 chart
- #435
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Hadassah went to 529 girls in 2025, but Hadassa is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 650, which makes it the 435th most-given girls’ name of the year — 134 places above the chart.
- Hadassah529
- Hadassa121
About 1 girl in 2,473 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 3,038 for Hadassah 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 Bobbye test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Hadassah's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Bobbye climbed just as high around 1931, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Bobbye's path sketches the road Hadassah is walking now.
Hadassah 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 Hadassah is headed
Hadassah 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.
Hadassah beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Hadassah in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A settled, documented meaning — the myrtle — with a single clear biblical source in Esther 2:7, so the answer never changes.
- Recognizable in Hebrew, English, Spanish and French with only small spelling shifts.
- Several real short forms already in use: Dassi, Hadas, Dassah.
- A written record stretching back over two thousand years, with no gap in use among Hebrew speakers.
- The spelling will need repeating: two s's, an h at each end, and no obvious phonetic cue for the final -ah. Most people get there on the second try.
- For many American adults the first association is the women's Zionist organization and the Jerusalem hospital that bears the name, rather than a child.
- Stress placement varies between Hebrew and English usage, so she will hear her name said a few different ways before she learns which correction is worth making.
- It carries a clear Jewish identity. That is a strength for many families and simply a fact to weigh for others.
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Hadassah
Feminine · Hebrew roots · #569 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Hadassahs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 9,200 people named Hadassah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Hadassah?
- Hadassah is the most-used spelling in US records — 529 of the 650 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Hadassa.
- How popular is the name Hadassah in 2025?
- Hadassah ranks #569 among US girl names in 2025, with 529 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Hadassah?
- About 1 in every 3,038 US girls born in 2025 was named Hadassah — 529 in all.
- Will my child share the name Hadassah with classmates?
- Hadassah will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Hadassah
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Allie#569 · Miller#571 · Amalia#566 · Makayla#566 · Lina#572 · Ivanna#566 · Estelle#573 · Nadia#565
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Hadassah? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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