Nissi
Feminine · “My banner”
Nissi comes from a place name that is really a sentence. After a battle in the wilderness, Moses builds an altar and calls it Yahweh-Nissi — the Lord is my banner. The name is the second half of that, and its American peak is 2024, which makes it one of the newest names in the record.
How old is the name Nissi?
Nissi first appears in US birth records in 1986 — 39 years ago. The typical Nissi is a kid of about 12 — this name's wave is very recent. About 600 people named Nissi are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Nissi most popular?
Nissi peaked in 2024, reaching #4207 nationally. Today it ranks #5238, 1,031 places below that high. See the whole 2024 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From nissī to Nissi
The story of Nissi
The altar-naming in Exodus belongs to a set of Hebrew place names that are declarations — Yahweh-Yireh, the Lord will provide; Yahweh-Shalom, the Lord is peace; Yahweh-Nissi, the Lord is my banner. These have had a long life in Christian preaching, and in the twentieth century they became a source of given names in African and African-diaspora Christianity in particular. Nissi is used in Nigeria and Ghana and among Nigerian-American families, and separately in American evangelical naming. Its very recent American peak reflects both, and the name is still rising in the data rather than settled.
Meaning
My banner
From Hebrew nēs, a banner, standard or ensign, with the first-person possessive suffix, giving nissī, my banner. It appears in Exodus 17:15, where Moses names an altar YHWH-nissī after the defeat of the Amalekites. The same word nēs came in later Hebrew to mean a miracle, which is why the name is sometimes glossed that way; the banner reading is the one in the verse.
How the name formed
- nissī
- Nissi
Related forms: נִסִּי · Nissi
Pronouncing Nissi
NISS-ee
Two syllables, stress on the first. Hebrew gives the second syllable more weight, nis-SEE, and both are heard in American use.
Nicknames for Nissi
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
- 1986
- Most girls named
- 202434 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #4207reached in 2024
- Change vs 2024
- −29.4%24 in 2025, from 34
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.
Nissi in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- נִסִּי in Hebrew — transliteration
- Nissi in English — same name
Nissis among us
people named Nissi are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 66,969 born in 2025 was named Nissi
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Nissi
- #5238
- Nissi on the 2025 chart
- #929
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Nissi went to 24 girls in 2025, but Nissy is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 31, which makes it the 929th most-given girls’ name of the year — 4,309 places above the chart.
- Nissi24
- Nissy7
About 1 girl in 51,847 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 66,969 for Nissi 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 Tashayla test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Nissi's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Tashayla climbed just as high around 1991, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Tashayla's path sketches the road Nissi is walking now.
Nissi 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
Nissi beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Nissi 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 settled, biblical and unusually vivid.
- Five letters and two syllables keep it simple.
- Everyone can say it after one hearing.
- It is unfamiliar to most Americans and will be assumed to be a nickname.
- Nissi, Nisi and Nissy are all possible spellings.
- The stress placement differs between Hebrew and English.
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What they receive
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Nissi
Feminine · #5238 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Nissis are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 600 people named Nissi are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Nissi?
- Nissi is the most-used spelling in US records — 24 of the 31 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Nissy.
- How popular is the name Nissi in 2025?
- Nissi ranks #5238 among US girl names in 2025, with 24 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Nissi?
- About 1 in every 66,969 US girls born in 2025 was named Nissi — 24 in all.
- Will my child share the name Nissi with classmates?
- Nissi will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Nissi
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Irena#5238 · Esma#5238 · Dagny#5238 · Venice#5238 · Lisbeth#5238 · Loralie#5238 · Alania#5238 · Erma#5238
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Nissi? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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