Johna
Feminine · “God has been gracious”
Johna is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 2,456 girls against 6 boys since 1880.
Johna is the bare Latin feminine of the English John — a vowel on the end and nothing else. That is the plainest way any language has of making a woman's name from a man's, and it produces something with a silent h sitting in the middle of five letters.
How old is the name Johna?
Johna first appears in US birth records in 1925 — 100 years ago. The typical Johna alive today was born around 1973, making them about 52 years old. About 2,200 people named Johna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Johna most popular?
Johna peaked in 1963, reaching #1099 nationally. See the whole 1963 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Yohanan to Johna
The story of Johna
Every other English women's name from this source came the long way, through French, and lost the h on the journey: Jane, Joan, Jean, Janet, Jenny. This one was built directly on the English man's name, in America, in the twentieth century, which is why the h is still there. In a five-letter name a silent letter is a quarter of what is written, and it is the only visible sign of the route the name took — everything else about it is a plain Latin ending on a plain English base.
Meaning
God has been gracious
From the Hebrew name behind John, unchanged. The added vowel carries no meaning and the h carries no sound.
How the name formed
- Yohanan
- John
- Johna
Pronouncing Johna
JOH-nuh
Two syllables with the weight at the front. The h is silent, exactly as it is in John.
Nicknames for Johna
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
- 1925
- Most girls named
- 196398 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1099reached in 1963
- Change vs 2014
- 0.0%5 in 2024, from 5
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.
Johnas among us
people named Johna 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
Johna 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
- Every part of it is familiar, so it is read correctly at sight.
- Jo is a ready short form and a standing name of its own.
- It sits behind one of the most-used names in the world.
- The silent h will be dropped by anyone writing from hearing.
- The spelling is recorded for boys as well as girls in the United States.
- It reads clearly as a name of the middle of the twentieth century.
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Johna
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Johnas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 2,200 people named Johna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Johna in 2025?
- Johna is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Johna with classmates?
- Johna will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More J names
The most-given names starting with J, all years combined.
Jennifer#586 · Jessica#665 · Janet#2778 · Julie#872 · Joyce#1071 · Joan#1085 · Julia#131 · Jean#2117
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Johna? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Johna and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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