Roxanne
Feminine · “bright”
Roxanne is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 59,532 girls against 55 boys since 1880.
Roxanne began in Central Asia as a word for brightness, traveled into Greek with Alexander's army, and has been written down for well over two thousand years since. It has three clear beats and lands on the last one — rok-SAN — which is why it has been sung, shouted and set to music more often than most names its size. Ready-made short forms have followed it the whole way.
How old is the name Roxanne?
Roxanne first appears in US birth records in 1906 — 119 years ago. The typical Roxanne alive today was born around 1966, making them about 59 years old. About 53,500 people named Roxanne are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Roxanne most popular?
Roxanne peaked in 1954, reaching #158 nationally. Today it ranks #1309, 1,151 places below that high. See the whole 1954 chart.
Roxanne appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From Roshanak to Roxanne
The story of Roxanne
The oldest form is the Iranian name Roshanak, borne by a Bactrian noblewoman who married Alexander the Great in the fourth century BC; Greek writers rendered it Rhōxanē, and Latin turned that into Roxana. From there it stayed in circulation as a literary name rather than a common one — Daniel Defoe titled a novel Roxana in 1724, and Edmond Rostand gave the beloved cousin in Cyrano de Bergerac the name Roxane at the end of the nineteenth century. The doubled-n English spelling Roxanne is the newest of the set, and the one American records know best. A rock song in the late 1970s put the name in front of an enormous audience all over again.
Meaning
bright, shining
The root is the Old Iranian word for light and brightness, still visible in Persian roshan. The familiar glosses "dawn" and "little star" both grow out of that same idea of shining.
How the name formed
- Roshanak
- Rhōxanē
- Roxana
- Roxane
- Roxanne
Related forms: Roshanak · Roxane · Roxana · Rossana · Roksana · Roxani
Pronouncing Roxanne
rok-SAN
Stress falls on the second syllable. The French form Roxane is said the same way; the Spanish and Romanian Roxana adds a third syllable, rok-SAH-na.
Nicknames for Roxanne
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
- 1906
- Most girls named
- 19552,092 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #158reached in 1954
- Change vs 2023
- −1.7%170 in 2025, from 173
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.
Roxanne in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Roshanak in Persian — related form
- Roxane in French — spelling variant
- Roxana in Spanish — same name
- Rossana in Italian — related form
- Roksana in Polish — transliteration
- Roxani in Greek — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Roxannes among us
people named Roxanne are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 9,455 born in 2025 was named Roxanne
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Rosemarie test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Roxanne's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Rosemarie climbed just as high around 1936, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Rosemarie's path sketches the road Roxanne is walking now.
Roxanne 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 Roxanne is headed
Roxanne 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.
Roxanne beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Roxanne in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Two long-established short forms, Roxy and Roxie, are already waiting — no invention required.
- A documented history stretching from ancient Bactria through Greek, Latin, French and English, with recognizable forms in each.
- Familiar to almost everyone in the United States by sound, so it rarely needs explaining or repeating.
- Distinctive without being unfamiliar: sharing a classroom with another Roxanne is unlikely.
- Roxanne, Roxane and Roxana all exist and all get used, so expect to spell it out on forms and correct the occasional Roxanna.
- The Police song is the thing many people will say — or sing — on hearing the name. Its subject matter is a woman selling sex, which some parents mind and others never think about again.
- It is well represented among people now in their fifties and sixties, so for a while it may read as a grown-up's name rather than a child's — the usual position of a name on its way back.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Roxanne to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Roxanne
Feminine · #1309 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Roxannes are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 53,500 people named Roxanne are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Roxanne in 2025?
- Roxanne ranks #1309 among US girl names in 2025, with 170 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Roxanne?
- About 1 in every 9,455 US girls born in 2025 was named Roxanne — 170 in all.
- Will my child share the name Roxanne with classmates?
- Roxanne will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Roxanne
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Chanel#1309 · Ansley#1309 · Zaina#1309 · Emilie#1309 · Aylah#1309 · Hollyn#1309 · Zaya#1309 · Renley#1309
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Roxanne? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Roxanne and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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