Mea
Feminine · “my”
Mea in Latin is not a noun. It is the feminine of meus, my, the word in mea culpa and mea maxima culpa, so the name is a possessive adjective with nothing to possess: a piece of grammar used as a name.
How old is the name Mea?
Mea first appears in US birth records in 1954 — 71 years ago. The typical Mea alive today was born around 2006, making them about 19 years old. About 1,700 people named Mea are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mea most popular?
Mea peaked in 2005, reaching #1755 nationally. Today it ranks #6546, 4,791 places below that high. See the whole 2005 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Maria to Mea
The story of Mea
Function words rarely become names, because they carry no image; the exceptions are usually accidents of resemblance. Mea is one: the Latin word is familiar to anyone who has met mea culpa, but almost every American bearer of the name arrived through Mia, itself a Scandinavian and Italian short form of Maria that became one of the most popular names in the world in the 2000s. The respelling with an e rather than an i is the whole of the difference. Mea's best year in United States records is 2005, in the middle of the Mia wave, which is where its rise comes from.
Meaningscholars disagree
my, mine (Latin)
Latin mea is the feminine singular of the possessive adjective meus, my. It is best known from the phrase mea culpa, my fault. Separately, Hawaiian mea means a thing or a person, Maori mea likewise, and the modern American Mea is most often simply a respelling of Mia, which descends from Maria. All three are live and the spelling does not choose.
How the name formed
- Maria
- Mia
- Mea
Related forms: Mia · Mea · Mea
Pronouncing Mea
MAY-uh
Two syllables in the Latin reading. Most American families say MEE-uh, following Mia, and the spelling gives no instruction either way.
Nicknames for Mea
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
- 1954
- Most girls named
- 2005112 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1755reached in 2005
- Change vs 2024
- −22.7%17 in 2025, from 22
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.
Mea in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Mia in English — spelling variant
- Mea in Latin — related form
- Mea in Hawaiian — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Pennsylvania.
Meas among us
people named Mea are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 94,545 born in 2025 was named Mea
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Mea
- #6546
- Mea on the 2025 chart
- #928
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Mea went to 17 girls in 2025, but Meah is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 32, which makes it the 928th most-given girls’ name of the year — 5,618 places above the chart.
- Mea17
- Meah15
About 1 girl in 50,227 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 94,545 for Mea 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 Kourtni test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Mea's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Kourtni climbed just as high around 1990, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Kourtni's path sketches the road Mea is walking now.
Mea 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
Mea beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Mea in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Three letters, and about as simple as a name can be to write.
- Sounds identical to the very popular Mia while looking different.
- Open syllables throughout, so it is easy for speakers of any language.
- Two pronunciations circulate, MEE-uh and MAY-uh.
- Mia is the standard spelling of the sound and will be written instead.
- The Latin word is a possessive adjective rather than a noun.
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What they receive
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Mea
Feminine · #6546 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Meas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,700 people named Mea are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Mea?
- Mea is the most-used spelling in US records — 17 of the 32 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Meah.
- How popular is the name Mea in 2025?
- Mea ranks #6546 among US girl names in 2025, with 17 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Mea?
- About 1 in every 94,545 US girls born in 2025 was named Mea — 17 in all.
- Will my child share the name Mea with classmates?
- Mea will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Mea
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Roseann#6546 · Solveig#6546 · Elona#6546 · Rosette#6546 · Bradie#6546 · Rida#6546 · Gwendalyn#6546 · Lorene#6546
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mea? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Mea and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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