Juliana
Feminine · “Feminine form of Julianus”
Juliana is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 67,748 girls against 49 boys since 1880.
Juliana is the Roman name Iuliana, worn continuously since the days of the empire and still spelled the same way in Spanish, Portuguese and Dutch. Four syllables that open wide in the middle and settle softly at the end, with the ready-made shorter names Julia, Julie and Jules folded inside it. It has been a martyr's name, a medieval English favorite, and a queen's.
How old is the name Juliana?
Juliana first appears in US birth records in 1881 — 144 years ago. The typical Juliana alive today was born around 2008, making them about 17 years old. About 64,500 people named Juliana are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Juliana most popular?
Juliana peaked in 2010, reaching #146 nationally. Today it ranks #256, 110 places below that high. See the whole 2010 chart.
Juliana appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From Iulius to Juliana
The story of Juliana
Iulius was one of the great Roman family names; Iulianus was formed from it, and Iuliana was its feminine. The name spread through the early church with Saint Juliana of Nicomedia, an early-fourth-century martyr whose cult reached far into western Europe, and by the Middle Ages Juliana was common enough in England to wear down into Gillian and Jill. The Latin spelling stayed intact in Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands and much of Latin America, while French produced Julienne, Italian Giuliana and German Juliane. In the twentieth century it was the name of a reigning Dutch queen, Juliana, who held the throne from the late 1940s into 1980.
Meaningscholars disagree
Feminine form of Julianus, 'of the family of Julius'
That Juliana comes from the Roman family name Julius is not in doubt. What Julius itself meant is: one long-standing reading connects it to Greek ioulos, 'downy-bearded' or 'youthful', another ties the family name to Jupiter/Jove. Baby-name books often print 'youthful' as settled; it is really the better-liked of two guesses.
How the name formed
- Iulius
- Iulianus
- Iuliana
- Juliana
- Gillian
Related forms: Giuliana · Julienne · Juliane · Julianna · Yuliana · Gillian
Pronouncing Juliana
joo-lee-AH-na
English speakers also say joo-lee-AN-a, with a flat middle vowel, and both are accepted. In Spanish and Portuguese the initial J takes a throatier sound: hoo-lee-AH-na.
Nicknames for Juliana
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
- 1881
- Most girls named
- 20082,150 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #146reached in 2010
- Change vs 2022
- −11.8%1,203 in 2025, from 1,364
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.
Juliana in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Giuliana in Italian — same name
- Julienne in French — same name
- Juliane in German — same name
- Julianna in Polish / Hungarian — spelling variant
- Yuliana in Russian — transliteration
- Gillian in English (medieval) — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Julianas among us
people named Juliana are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 1,336 born in 2025 was named Juliana
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Juliana
- #256
- Juliana on the 2025 chart
- #158
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Juliana went to 1,203 girls in 2025, but Julianna is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 1,982, which makes it the 158th most-given girls’ name of the year — 98 places above the chart.
- Juliana1,203
- Julianna779
About 1 girl in 811 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 1,336 for Juliana 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 Faye test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Juliana's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Faye climbed just as high around 1934, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Faye's path sketches the road Juliana is walking now.
Juliana 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 Juliana is headed
Juliana 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.
Juliana beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Juliana in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled identically in Spanish, Portuguese and Dutch, so it crosses borders without being reissued in a new form.
- Comes with several ready-made short forms — Julia, Julie, Jules, Ana — each of which also works as a full name.
- An unbroken record from Roman times through the medieval church to the present, with no gap needing explanation.
- Familiar to nearly everyone, while a child is unlikely to share it with a classmate.
- Strongest in California, Texas and New York, so it reads as unremarkable in much of the country.
- The Juli- family is crowded: Julia, Julie, Juliet, Julianna, Julianne and Juliane all sit close by, and Juliana will be misheard or respelled as one of them fairly often.
- Two pronunciations circulate in English — the AH middle and the flatter AN middle — so expect to correct people, or to accept both.
- Because the built-in short forms are so strong, a Juliana may spend much of her life being called Julia or Julie. That is easy to live with, but worth deciding how you feel about it now.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Juliana
Feminine · #256 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Julianas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 64,500 people named Juliana are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Juliana?
- Juliana is the most-used spelling in US records — 1,203 of the 1,982 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Julianna.
- How popular is the name Juliana in 2025?
- Juliana ranks #256 among US girl names in 2025, with 1,203 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Juliana?
- About 1 in every 1,336 US girls born in 2025 was named Juliana — 1,203 in all.
- Will my child share the name Juliana with classmates?
- Juliana will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Juliana
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Kaylee#255 · Amy#257 · Journee#258 · Faith#254 · Kailani#253 · Leila#259 · Adalyn#260 · Lilly#252
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Juliana? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Juliana and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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