Janis
Feminine · “God is gracious”
Janis is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 48,841 girls against 174 boys since 1880.
Janis is Jane extended twice over. English made Janet and Janice by adding endings to Jane, and Janis is the s-spelling of the second — a name built on a name built on a name.
How old is the name Janis?
Janis first appears in US birth records in 1909 — 116 years ago. The typical Janis alive today was born around 1952, making them about 73 years old. About 34,500 people named Janis are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Janis most popular?
Janis peaked in 1947, reaching #108 nationally. Today it ranks #9457, 9,349 places below that high. See the whole 1947 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Yohanan to Janis
The story of Janis
Jane arrived in English from French in the Middle Ages and became one of the standard women's names of the language. Nineteenth-century writers and families extended it: Janet in Scotland by a diminutive ending, Janice in America by an ending borrowed from nowhere in particular — it first appears in a novel of 1899. Janis is the spelling variant of that, and it rose alongside Janice through the 1930s and 1940s, peaking in the late 1940s.
Meaning
God is gracious
Through Jane, from the French Jehanne, feminine of Jehan — John — from the Hebrew Yohanan, 'the Lord is gracious'. The -ice and -is endings carry no meaning of their own; they are decoration in the way that -ette and -ina are.
How the name formed
- Yohanan
- Jehanne
- Jane
- Janice
- Janis
Related forms: Janet · Janice · Jānis · Jeanne
Pronouncing Janis
JAN-iss
Two syllables, stress on the first. In Latvian the same spelling with a long a is a common man's name, said YAH-nis.
Nicknames for Janis
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
- 1909
- Most girls named
- 19473,205 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #108reached in 1947
- Change vs 2023
- −9.1%10 in 2025, from 11
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.
Janis in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Janet in Scottish — related form
- Janice in English — spelling variant
- Jānis in Latvian — related form
- Jeanne in French — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas.
Janiss among us
people named Janis are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 160,727 born in 2025 was named Janis
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Geneva test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Janis's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Geneva climbed just as high around 1920, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Geneva's path sketches the road Janis is walking now.
Janis 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
Janis beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Janis in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It sits inside the largest name family in Europe, with cousins in every language.
- Two crisp syllables that stand up well against a long surname.
- Jan is available as a short form with its own independent record.
- Janice is commoner in American records and will be assumed by anyone writing it down.
- In Latvia the same spelling is a man's name, which occasionally causes confusion abroad.
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What they receive
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Janis
Feminine · #9457 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Janiss are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 34,500 people named Janis are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Janis in 2025?
- Janis ranks #9457 among US girl names in 2025, with 10 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Janis?
- About 1 in every 160,727 US girls born in 2025 was named Janis — 10 in all.
- Will my child share the name Janis with classmates?
- Janis will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Janis
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Leta#9457 · Inga#9457 · Delphia#9457 · Cammie#9457 · Lisandra#9457 · Amee#9457 · Venecia#9457 · Annetta#9457
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Janis? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Janis and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Cast your vote
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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