Tabitha
Feminine · Aramaic roots · “gazelle”
Tabitha is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 59,200 girls against 146 boys since 1880.
Tabitha comes to English from a single scene in the Book of Acts, where a woman of Joppa known by that name is mourned and restored. The Puritans picked it up from scripture and carried it across the Atlantic, and it has been read aloud in English ever since. Three light syllables, all of them obvious on the page.
How old is the name Tabitha?
Tabitha was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Tabitha alive today was born around 1987, making them about 38 years old. About 57,000 people named Tabitha are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Tabitha most popular?
Tabitha peaked in 1978, reaching #126 nationally. Today it ranks #1299, 1,173 places below that high. See the whole 1978 chart.
Where it comes from
From ṭabyetā (Aramaic) to Tabitha
The story of Tabitha
The name belongs to Aramaic, and reached the rest of the world through the Greek New Testament, where Ταβιθά appears in the ninth chapter of Acts as a woman of Joppa known for her charity. English-speaking Protestants who took their names from scripture rather than from saints' calendars adopted it in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and Puritan families brought it to New England. It stayed a quiet, mostly rural English and American name for generations. Then a young character called Tabitha appeared on the American sitcom Bewitched in the 1960s, and the name climbed sharply on both sides of the Atlantic for about two decades.
Meaning
gazelle
From Aramaic ṭabyetā. The Book of Acts gives the Greek equivalent alongside it — Dorcas, which also means gazelle — so the sense is recorded in the text itself.
How the name formed
- ṭabyetāAramaic
- ΤαβιθάGreek, New Testament
- Tabitha
Related forms: Tabita · Tabita · Tabita · Tabita · Тавифа (Tavifa) · Tabatha
Pronouncing Tabitha
TAB-ih-thuh
Stress on the first syllable, with the 'th' soft as in 'think'. Almost no one hesitates over it in English.
Nicknames for Tabitha
High
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
- 1966 — Baby Tabitha debuts on Bewitched
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1880
- Most girls named
- 19842,106 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #126reached in 1978
- Change vs 2022
- +14.0%171 in 2025, from 150
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.
Tabitha in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Tabita in Spanish — same name
- Tabita in Portuguese — same name
- Tabita in Polish — same name
- Tabita in Finnish — same name
- Тавифа (Tavifa) in Russian — transliteration
- Tabatha in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Florida.
Tabithas among us
people named Tabitha are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 9,399 born in 2025 was named Tabitha
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 Sandy test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Tabitha's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Sandy climbed just as high around 1960, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Sandy's path sketches the road Tabitha is walking now.
Tabitha 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 Tabitha is headed
Tabitha 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.
Tabitha beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Tabitha in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled the way it sounds and read correctly on first sight by most English speakers.
- A continuous written record going back to the Greek New Testament, and continuous English use since the Puritans.
- Ready-made short forms — Tabby, Tabs — that have been in use for centuries, plus a full formal version for documents.
- Familiar to nearly everyone while rarely duplicated in a classroom.
- Recognizable in Spanish, Portuguese and Polish as Tabita, so it travels without translation.
- Tabby is the most natural nickname and is also the everyday word for a striped cat. Most Tabithas hear the joke early, and how much it matters depends largely on whether the short form gets used at all.
- Tabatha is a genuine competing spelling, so expect the occasional need to clarify which one you mean — a small, lifelong correction rather than a real problem.
- The mid-century Bewitched character is still the association some older generations reach for first, which can make the name feel tied to a particular era for them and not at all for younger ears.
- It carries a clear biblical origin. For some families that is the appeal; if it isn't yours, know that the connection is well enough known that it may be mentioned to you.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Tabitha to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Tabitha
Feminine · Aramaic roots · #1299 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Tabithas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 57,000 people named Tabitha are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Tabitha in 2025?
- Tabitha ranks #1299 among US girl names in 2025, with 171 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Tabitha?
- About 1 in every 9,399 US girls born in 2025 was named Tabitha — 171 in all.
- Will my child share the name Tabitha with classmates?
- Tabitha will almost certainly be the only one in school.
- What explains the spikes and dips on Tabitha's chart?
- Tabitha climbed after 1966 — Baby Tabitha debuts on Bewitched.
Ranked beside Tabitha
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Lizbeth#1299 · Kaycee#1299 · Kodi#1299 · Jaylee#1299 · Blossom#1299 · Althea#1299 · Rae#1299 · Elayna#1299
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Tabitha? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Tabitha and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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