Josephine
Feminine · “he will add”
Josephine is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 331,467 girls against 991 boys since 1880. See Josephine as a boy name
Josephine Baker smuggled intelligence for the Resistance in her sheet music. She was already the most famous entertainer in France, which meant she could cross borders with a trunk of scores and nobody looked twice — and she wrote in invisible ink between the staves.
How old is the name Josephine?
Josephine was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Josephine alive today was born around 1927, making them about 98 years old. About 123,000 people named Josephine are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Josephine most popular?
Josephine peaked in 1916, reaching #21 nationally. Today it ranks #53, 32 places below that high. See the whole 1916 chart.
Josephine appears on these lists:
- Vintage names making a comeback
- Grandmother-chic: 1920s names ready to return
- Long and elegant: names with room to breathe
- Distinctly American names
- America's top 100 names right now
- Greatest Generation names (born 1901–1927)
- all guides
Works in French families too:
Where it comes from
From a Hebrew sentence about a son being added to Josephine
The story of Josephine
She had left America at nineteen because there was no work for a Black performer that did not humiliate her, and became a star in Paris within a year. During the war she carried messages, worked for the Free French and was decorated afterwards. She adopted twelve children of different nationalities and religions and called them the Rainbow Tribe, on the argument that if they could grow up as siblings the case for tolerance made itself. In 2021 she was interred in the Pantheon, the first Black woman to be given that honor.
Meaning
he will add
Joseph is a Hebrew sentence about God adding another son, and the feminine is French. The name arrived in English use in the early nineteenth century, went to the top of the American charts before the First World War, disappeared for three generations and has now come back — it is one of the clearest examples of the hundred-year rule, by which a name becomes usable again once nobody's grandmother has it.
Cultural footprint
Josephine Baker (b. 1906) — Jazz Age superstar who became a French Resistance agent in WWII
Josephine Cochrane (b. 1839) — Invented the dishwasher
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- a Hebrew sentence about a son being added
- French builds the feminine Josephine
- an empress makes it fashionable across Europe
- an American peak before the First World War
- back in the top hundred a century later
Related forms: Josephine · Giuseppina · Josefina · Josefine
Pronouncing Josephine
JO-suh-feen
Three syllables with the stress at the front and a secondary one at the back. French puts the weight on the last syllable, which some American families keep.
Nicknames for Josephine
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
- 1880
- Most girls named
- 19188,682 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #21reached in 1916
- Change vs 2022
- +26.3%4,126 in 2025, from 3,266
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.
Josephine in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Josephine in French — same name
- Giuseppina in Italian — same name
- Josefina in Spanish — same name
- Josefine in German — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York. International figures from Statistics Canada. Sources
Josephines among us
people named Josephine are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 390 born in 2025 was named Josephine
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 Gladys test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Josephine's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Gladys climbed just as high around 1901, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Gladys's path sketches the road Josephine is walking now.
Josephine has held the top-100 across 7 different decades — it has never depended on fashion, and names like that read the same at any age.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Josephine is headed
Josephine 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.
Josephine beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Josephine in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Josie and Jo are both available and both are thoroughly current.
- It is elegant and long on paper with plain short forms for daily use.
- It works without alteration across most of Europe.
- It is rising fast, so it will be commoner among her contemporaries than in the record.
- Three syllables and a French ending is a formal name for a small child.
- Josephine and Josefina will both be written, depending on who is listening.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Josephine to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Josephine
Feminine · #53 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Josephines are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 123,000 people named Josephine are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Josephine in 2025?
- Josephine ranks #53 among US girl names in 2025, with 4,126 babies given the name.
- How common is the name Josephine?
- About 1 in every 390 US girls born in 2025 was named Josephine — 4,126 in all.
- Will my child share the name Josephine with classmates?
- Josephine will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Josephine
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Stella#52 · Victoria#54 · Delilah#51 · Sophie#55 · Hannah#56 · Sadie#50 · Lillian#57 · Eloise#49
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Josephine? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Josephine and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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