Petra
Feminine · Greek roots · “rock”
Petra is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 14,559 girls against 67 boys since 1880.
Petra is the Latin feminine of Petrus, and behind both stands one plain Greek word: petra, rock. The same word gave its name to the Nabataean city carved into the sandstone cliffs of southern Jordan, which Greek speakers simply called The Rock. Two syllables, six letters, and no silent anything — it lands the same way in English, German, Spanish and Czech.
How old is the name Petra?
Petra first appears in US birth records in 1881 — 144 years ago. The typical Petra alive today was born around 1960, making them about 65 years old. About 9,200 people named Petra are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Petra most popular?
Petra peaked in 1894, reaching #429 nationally. Today it ranks #1367, 938 places below that high. See the whole 1894 chart.
Petra appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From petra (Greek, 'rock') to Petra
The story of Petra
The Greek noun petra meant a rock or crag, and it entered the world of names through the Gospels, where Simon is given the name Petros — the rock. Latin turned that into Petrus, and Petrus into the feminine Petra, which spread across Christian Europe alongside its masculine twin. The same Greek word named Petra in Jordan, the Nabataean city cut directly into rose-colored cliff faces, a place Greek and Roman writers knew well. In the twentieth century the name ran especially strong in German-speaking countries, the Netherlands and the Czech lands, where whole classrooms of Petras grew up together, and it has been carried in Spanish- and Italian-speaking families for far longer than that.
Meaning
rock, stone
From Greek petra, 'rock'. The masculine Petros gave Latin Petrus and English Peter; Petra is the feminine of the same word.
How the name formed
- petraGreek, 'rock'
- PetrusLatin
- Petra
Related forms: Petra · Petra · Petra · Pietra · Pierrette · Petroula
Pronouncing Petra
PET-ruh
Stress on the first syllable throughout. German, Dutch and Scandinavian speakers lengthen the first vowel closer to PAY-tra; Spanish and Czech keep it crisp, PEH-tra. English speakers occasionally try PEE-truh at first sight, but one correction usually settles it.
Nicknames for Petra
High
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
- 1881
- Most girls named
- 1922189 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #429reached in 1894
- Change vs 2022
- +15.0%161 in 2025, from 140
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.
Petra in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Petra in German — same name
- Petra in Czech and Slovak — same name
- Petra in Spanish — same name
- Pietra in Italian — related form
- Pierrette in French — related form
- Petroula in Greek — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Petras among us
people named Petra are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 9,983 born in 2025 was named Petra
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
Fashion outlook
Petra 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 Petra is headed
Petra should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
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.
Petra beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Petra in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled the same way in English, German, Spanish, Czech, Dutch and Hungarian — it crosses borders without a respelling.
- Short, fully phonetic, and unambiguous once heard; no silent letters and no rival spellings competing for it.
- A documented line running back through Latin Petrus to a single Greek word, so the meaning is easy to give and easy to remember.
- Established short forms already exist — Pet, Peta, Peťa — rather than having to be invented.
- The nickname Peta shares its sound with PETA, the American animal-rights organization, which may prompt a comment or two. The full name sidesteps this entirely.
- Because it is the direct feminine of Peter, some people will hear it as a female version of a man's name rather than a name in its own right — worth expecting, though it rarely lasts past introductions.
- In Germany, the Netherlands and the Czech Republic the name ran very strong in the middle of the last century, so relatives from those countries may place it with an older generation rather than a new baby.
- In American classrooms it is uncommon enough that a child is unlikely to meet another, which some families want and others don't.
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What they receive
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Petra
Feminine · Greek roots · #1367 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Petras are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 9,200 people named Petra are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Petra in 2025?
- Petra ranks #1367 among US girl names in 2025, with 161 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Petra?
- About 1 in every 9,983 US girls born in 2025 was named Petra — 161 in all.
- Will my child share the name Petra with classmates?
- Petra will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Petra
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Lindsey#1367 · Martina#1367 · Ayanna#1367 · Madalynn#1367 · Ameera#1367 · Montserrat#1373 · Asha#1373 · Keylani#1373
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Petra? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Petra and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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