Johanna
Feminine · “God is gracious”
Johanna is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 54,247 girls against 129 boys since 1880.
Johanna is the Latin feminine of Iohannes — the same root that gave English John — and it has been written this way for centuries across Germany, the Netherlands, Sweden and Finland. The Gospel of Luke names a Joanna among the women who followed Jesus, and the name has never really left use since. Said one way it begins with a soft Y, said another with a J; both are correct, and both have long histories behind them.
How old is the name Johanna?
Johanna was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Johanna alive today was born around 1981, making them about 44 years old. About 41,500 people named Johanna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Johanna most popular?
Johanna peaked in 1883, reaching #179 nationally. Today it ranks #869, 690 places below that high. See the whole 1883 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Yochanan to Johanna
The story of Johanna
The name begins with Hebrew Yochanan, carried into Greek as Ioannes and into Latin as Iohannes, where it acquired the feminine ending -a. Johanna became the standard written form across German-, Dutch- and Scandinavian-speaking Europe, appearing in parish registers for generation after generation, and the Gospel of Luke gives a Joanna among the women who traveled with Jesus. Nineteenth-century emigration brought the spelling to the United States in quantity, arriving with German, Swedish, Irish and Dutch families and settling into American records alongside the plainer Joanna and Joan. It has stayed in continuous use here ever since, familiar without ever crowding a classroom.
Meaning
God is gracious
From Hebrew Yochanan, "Yahweh is gracious" — the meaning it shares with John, Jane, Joan and Jean.
How the name formed
- Yochanan
- Ioannes
- Iohannes
- Johannes
- Johanna
Related forms: Joanna · Giovanna · Juana · Jeanne · Ioanna · Jana
Pronouncing Johanna
yo-HAH-na
That is the German, Dutch and Scandinavian pronunciation. In American English it is just as often joh-HAN-uh, rhyming with the second half of Joanna. Either is correct; deciding early saves a lifetime of gentle corrections.
Nicknames for Johanna
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
- 1880
- Most girls named
- 1984919 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #179reached in 1883
- Change vs 2022
- −13.7%309 in 2025, from 358
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.
Johanna in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Joanna in English — spelling variant
- Giovanna in Italian — same name
- Juana in Spanish — same name
- Jeanne in French — same name
- Ioanna in Greek — transliteration
- Jana in Czech — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Johannas among us
people named Johanna are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 5,202 born in 2025 was named Johanna
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Johanna
- #869
- Johanna on the 2025 chart
- #580
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Johanna went to 309 girls in 2025, but Johana and Johannah are the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 413, which makes it the 580th most-given girls’ name of the year — 289 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 3,892 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 5,202 for Johanna 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
Fashion outlook
Johanna 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 Johanna is headed
Johanna is easing off slowly — about 16% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
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.
Johanna beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Johanna in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Two well-established short forms with quite different characters — Jo and Hanna — plus Josie, so the name flexes without being cut down against the grain.
- Recognizable in German, Dutch, Swedish, Finnish and Latin records alike, which makes it travel well across languages and borders.
- A documented line running from Hebrew through Greek and Latin into modern European use, with the same meaning intact throughout.
- Familiar enough that nobody needs it explained, uncommon enough that a Johanna will rarely share it in a classroom.
- The Y-start and the J-start are both legitimate, which means the name will be pronounced two ways by strangers for life. Families usually pick one and repeat it patiently.
- It sits very close to Joanna, Joanne, Joann and Johana, so expect the H to be dropped or added by people writing it down from hearing it.
- The name is still strongly represented among adults, so it may read as a grown woman's name before it reads as a baby's — something that tends to even out as a child grows into it.
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What they receive
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Johanna
Feminine · #869 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Johannas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 41,500 people named Johanna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Johanna?
- Johanna is the most-used spelling in US records — 309 of the 413 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Johana and Johannah.
- How popular is the name Johanna in 2025?
- Johanna ranks #869 among US girl names in 2025, with 309 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Johanna?
- About 1 in every 5,202 US girls born in 2025 was named Johanna — 309 in all.
- Will my child share the name Johanna with classmates?
- Johanna will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Johanna
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Ayah#869 · Aspyn#869 · Julie#872 · Marianna#872 · Adrianna#872 · Kahlani#875 · Kylee#875 · Eleanora#862
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Johanna? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Johanna and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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