Lyssa
Feminine
Lyssa is almost certainly the back half of Alyssa, and there is also a Greek goddess with the name who is worth knowing about. She personified frenzy, appears as a speaking character in a surviving tragedy where she is ordered to drive a hero mad and objects to the job, and her name became the technical Greek word for the state she represented.
How old is the name Lyssa?
Lyssa first appears in US birth records in 1947 — 78 years ago. The typical Lyssa alive today was born around 1991, making them about 34 years old. About 1,400 people named Lyssa are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Lyssa most popular?
Lyssa peaked in 1985, reaching #1691 nationally. See the whole 1985 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From A Greek word and goddess of frenzy to Lyssa
Our story of Lyssa
The Greek scene is remarkable. In Euripides, Hera sends two divine figures to destroy a hero's mind, and one of them, this one, argues: she says she takes no pleasure in the errand, that the man has done nothing to deserve it, and that she would rather not. She is overruled and does it anyway. It is one of very few places in Greek drama where a personified abstraction is given a conscience, and it has been noticed by readers for two and a half thousand years. The American name has no connection to any of this. It is the tail of a longer name that had itself appeared without a clear parent, cut loose in the ordinary way, and the coincidence with a Greek word is exactly that. Both facts are worth having; only one of them is about the name on the certificate.
Meaningnot established
Not established
As a clipping of Alyssa the name inherits an unsettled origin, because Alyssa's own ancestry is disputed and it may be a modern formation rather than a descendant of anything. The Greek word is genuine and means rage or frenzy, and it is not the source of the American name. Two meanings are available and only one of them is honest.
How the name formed
- A Greek word and goddess of frenzy
- Alyssa appearing in English without a clear parent
- The back half cut loose as a name of its own
- Lyssa in the American registers
Pronouncing Lyssa
LISS-uh
Two syllables, stress on the first. The y is doing the job of a short i, which is one of the two things that letter does in English and the less obvious of them at the start of a word.
Nicknames for Lyssa
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
- 1947
- Most girls named
- 198568 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1691reached in 1985
- Change vs 2022
- +40.0%7 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.
Lyssas among us
people named Lyssa 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
Lyssa 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
- It is short, soft and impossible to mispronounce.
- It is genuinely uncommon while sounding entirely familiar.
- Lys and Lyss are both usable and neither is shared with a crowd.
- Alyssa and Melissa are both far commoner and this will be read as a clipping of one.
- The Greek word means frenzy, which anybody looking the name up will find.
- There is no established meaning on the American route.
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Lyssa
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Lyssas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,400 people named Lyssa are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Lyssa in 2025?
- Lyssa is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Lyssa with classmates?
- Lyssa will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More L names
The most-given names starting with L, all years combined.
Linda#902 · Lisa#987 · Laura#379 · Lauren#401 · Lillian#57 · Lori#1721 · Louise#514 · Lois#1666
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Lyssa? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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