Pheobe
Feminine · “bright”
Phoebe is the only woman the New Testament calls a deacon. Paul commends her at the end of Romans as diakonos of the church at Cenchreae and asks that she be received; she is generally taken to have carried the letter itself.
How old is the name Pheobe?
Pheobe first appears in US birth records in 1882 — 143 years ago. The typical Pheobe alive today was born around 1998, making them about 27 years old. About 700 people named Pheobe are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Pheobe most popular?
Pheobe peaked in 1885, reaching #842 nationally. Today it ranks #6838, 5,996 places below that high. See the whole 1885 chart.
Where it comes from
From Phoibe to Pheobe
The story of Pheobe
The sixteenth chapter of Romans is a list of greetings, and it opens with Phoebe, described with a word that elsewhere in the New Testament is translated as minister or deacon and here has been rendered a dozen different ways depending on the translator's view of what women did in the early church. She is also called a prostatis, a patron or protector. English took the name from the Bible and from Greek myth together, and it was in ordinary Puritan use. The Pheobe spelling appears throughout American records and peaks in 1885; it is a transposition that has been made often enough to become a genuine variant.
Meaning
bright, radiant
Greek Phoibe, bright or radiant, the feminine of phoibos, an epithet of Apollo. Phoebe is also a Titaness in Hesiod, grandmother of Apollo and Artemis, and a name for the moon. This spelling transposes the o and the e of the standard one, which is one of the commonest transposition errors in English and has become a variant in its own right.
How the name formed
- Phoibe
- Phoebe
- Pheobe
Related forms: Phoebe · Foivi · Phebe
Pronouncing Pheobe
FEE-bee
Two syllables with the stress on the first. The ph is an f, as in every Greek borrowing, and the oe or eo is a single long e; both spellings sound identical.
Nicknames for Pheobe
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
- 1882
- Most girls named
- 200835 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #842reached in 1885
- Change vs 2023
- +14.3%16 in 2025, from 14
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.
Pheobe in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Phoebe in English — spelling variant
- Foivi in Greek — same name
- Phebe in French — same name
Pheobes among us
people named Pheobe are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 100,454 born in 2025 was named Pheobe
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
Pheobe 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
Pheobe beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Pheobe 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 and a genuinely significant New Testament figure.
- Bee is a short form with an independent life of its own.
- Familiar by sound to everyone while being an uncommon spelling.
- Phoebe is the standard spelling and this one reads as a transposition.
- It will be corrected on almost every form.
- The ph and the vowel pair together confuse readers meeting it cold.
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What they receive
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Pheobe
Feminine · #6838 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Pheobes are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 700 people named Pheobe are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Pheobe in 2025?
- Pheobe ranks #6838 among US girl names in 2025, with 16 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Pheobe?
- About 1 in every 100,454 US girls born in 2025 was named Pheobe — 16 in all.
- Will my child share the name Pheobe with classmates?
- Pheobe will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Pheobe
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Jeannie#6838 · Maxie#6838 · Nicol#6838 · Chaney#6838 · Keana#6838 · Concetta#6838 · Camia#6838 · Malana#6838
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Pheobe? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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