Karissa
Feminine · “dearest”
Karissa is dearest, in Latin — the superlative of carus, which is grammatically unusual for a name. Most names are nouns; this one is a comparison taken to its limit.
How old is the name Karissa?
Karissa first appears in US birth records in 1961 — 64 years ago. The typical Karissa alive today was born around 1996, making them about 29 years old. About 20,000 people named Karissa are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Karissa most popular?
Karissa peaked in 1991, reaching #306 nationally. Today it ranks #2895, 2,589 places below that high. See the whole 1991 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From carus to Karissa
The story of Karissa
Carissa appears in English literary use from the sixteenth century as an elaboration of the Latin, and Spenser uses a form of it. Its life as an ordinary given name is twentieth-century and American: it rose through the 1970s and 1980s alongside Marissa, Melissa and Clarissa, and the K spelling followed the fashion of the period, peaking in the mid-1990s.
Meaningscholars disagree
dearest, most beloved
The usual reading is the Latin carissima, 'dearest', the superlative of carus, 'dear'. A competing account derives it from the Greek charis, 'grace' — the root of Charity and Karis — which would make it a cousin rather than the same word. Both are plausible.
How the name formed
- carus
- carissima
- Carissa
- Karissa
Related forms: Carissa · Carissima · Charissa
Pronouncing Karissa
kuh-RISS-uh
Three syllables, stress in the middle. Karissa and Carissa are said identically.
Nicknames for Karissa
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
- 1961
- Most girls named
- 1991901 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #306reached in 1991
- Change vs 2024
- −13.4%58 in 2025, from 67
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.
Karissa in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Carissa in English — spelling variant
- Carissima in Italian — related form
- Charissa in English — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida.
Karissas among us
people named Karissa are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 27,712 born in 2025 was named Karissa
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Karissa
- #2895
- Karissa on the 2025 chart
- #856
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Karissa went to 58 girls in 2025, but Carissa is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 104, which makes it the 856th most-given girls’ name of the year — 2,039 places above the chart.
- Karissa58
- Carissa46
About 1 girl in 15,454 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 27,712 for Karissa 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 Rene test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Karissa's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Rene climbed just as high around 1962, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Rene's path sketches the road Karissa is walking now.
Karissa 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 Karissa is headed
Karissa is easing off slowly — about 17% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
Medium 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.
Karissa beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Karissa in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is warm, transparent and unusually emphatic — a superlative rather than a description.
- Rissa and Kari are both available and pull in different directions.
- Three syllables with a strong middle, a rhythm that carries well.
- Carissa is the older spelling and the origin is split between Latin and Greek.
- It sits in a crowded family of -issa names.
- It is closely dated to the 1990s in American records.
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What they receive
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Karissa
Feminine · #2895 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Karissas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 20,000 people named Karissa are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Karissa?
- Karissa is the most-used spelling in US records — 58 of the 104 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Carissa.
- How popular is the name Karissa in 2025?
- Karissa ranks #2895 among US girl names in 2025, with 58 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Karissa?
- About 1 in every 27,712 US girls born in 2025 was named Karissa — 58 in all.
- Will my child share the name Karissa with classmates?
- Karissa will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Karissa
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Noora#2895 · Mylie#2895 · Vanellope#2895 · Amore#2895 · Miamor#2895 · Alyah#2895 · Alaska#2895 · Anastacia#2895
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Karissa? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Karissa and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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