Ksenia
Feminine · “hospitality”
English cannot begin a word with ks. That combination is legal in Greek and in Russian and forbidden at the start of an English word, which is why we invented the letter x to cover it. Ksenia is the spelling that keeps the Slavic cluster and asks an English speaker to do something the language does not permit.
How old is the name Ksenia?
Ksenia first appears in US birth records in 1955 — 70 years ago. The typical Ksenia alive today was born around 2012, making them about 13 years old. About 500 people named Ksenia are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Ksenia most popular?
Ksenia peaked in 2016, reaching #4250 nationally. Today it ranks #6325, 2,075 places below that high. See the whole 2016 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From xenos to Ksenia
The story of Ksenia
Greek xenia passed into Byzantine Christian naming and from there to the Slavic Orthodox world, where Russian, Ukrainian and Serbian all took it. Russian writes it with a K because Cyrillic has no x for this sound, and when Russian names are romanised the K is carried straight across, producing Ksenia beside the Greek-derived Xenia. Both spell the same name; they differ only in which alphabet did the work of transliteration. In the United States both circulate, Xenia among Greek-descended families and Ksenia among Russian, Ukrainian and Polish ones, and the K form has been rising with post-Soviet migration. Its best American year on record is 2016, the most recent peak of any name in this group.
Meaning
hospitality, or guest and stranger
From Greek xenia, the ancient obligation of hospitality between host and guest, built on xenos, which means both stranger and guest. The same root gives English xenophobia and xenon. In the Orthodox tradition the name honors several saints, most famously Xenia of Saint Petersburg, an eighteenth-century holy fool venerated in Russia.
How the name formed
- xenos
- xenia
- Kseniya
- Ksenia
Related forms: Kseniya · Xenia · Ksenia · Oksana · Ksenija
Pronouncing Ksenia
KSEN-yah
Two syllables in Russian, stress on the first, with the k fully pronounced. English speakers almost always say SEN-ya, dropping the k, or KUH-sen-ya, inserting a vowel. Both are ordinary adaptations rather than errors.
Nicknames for Ksenia
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
- 1955
- Most girls named
- 201634 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #4250reached in 2016
- Change vs 2024
- −10.0%18 in 2025, from 20
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.
Ksenia in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Kseniya in Russian — transliteration
- Xenia in Greek — same name
- Ksenia in Polish — same name
- Oksana in Ukrainian — related form
- Ksenija in Serbian — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Florida, California.
Ksenias among us
people named Ksenia are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 89,293 born in 2025 was named Ksenia
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Ksenia
- #6325
- Ksenia on the 2025 chart
- #875
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Ksenia went to 18 girls in 2025, but Xenia and Xeniyah are the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 85, which makes it the 875th most-given girls’ name of the year — 5,450 places above the chart.
- Xenia58
- Ksenia18
- Xeniyah9
About 1 girl in 18,909 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 89,293 for Ksenia 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 Evonna test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Ksenia's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Evonna climbed just as high around 1939, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Evonna's path sketches the road Ksenia is walking now.
Ksenia 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
Ksenia beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Ksenia in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A settled Greek meaning tied to one of the oldest ideas in the classical world.
- Marks a Russian, Ukrainian or Polish heritage clearly and without explanation.
- Rare in the United States while being top-tier familiar across Eastern Europe.
- The initial ks is unpronounceable by English rules and will usually come out as s.
- Xenia, Kseniya and Ksenija are all the same name and all appear in American records.
- Expect to spell it letter by letter for the whole of a life in the United States.
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What they receive
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Ksenia
Feminine · #6325 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Ksenias are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 500 people named Ksenia are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Ksenia?
- Ksenia is one of 3 recorded spellings. Xenia is the more common one — 58 births in 2025 against 18 for Ksenia.
- How popular is the name Ksenia in 2025?
- Ksenia ranks #6325 among US girl names in 2025, with 18 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Ksenia?
- About 1 in every 89,293 US girls born in 2025 was named Ksenia — 18 in all.
- Will my child share the name Ksenia with classmates?
- Ksenia will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Ksenia
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Kaye#6325 · Doria#6325 · Karolyn#6325 · Rosaleen#6325 · Roni#6325 · Darian#6325 · Svetlana#6325 · Fanny#6325
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Ksenia? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Ksenia and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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