Twana
Feminine
Twana begins with a letter pair that American naming almost never uses. Tw- opens very few English words and fewer names, which makes Twana, Twanda and Twanna genuinely unusual in a tradition that otherwise reuses the same fronts constantly. There is also a people of that name on Puget Sound, entirely unconnected.
How old is the name Twana?
Twana first appears in US birth records in 1938 — 87 years ago. The typical Twana alive today was born around 1971, making them about 54 years old. About 2,000 people named Twana are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Twana most popular?
Twana peaked in 1974, reaching #1008 nationally. Today it ranks #14942, 13,934 places below that high. See the whole 1974 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
The story of Twana
The inventory of American name-building prefixes is not large, and most of the productive ones — La-, Sha-, Ta-, Ka-, De- — open hundreds of names each. Tw- opens a handful. That is what makes it interesting: a family choosing it was reaching outside the standard stock for something the ear would register as unfamiliar, and it works, because English gives a reader almost nothing to pattern-match against. The -ana ending is entirely conventional by contrast, which means the name is half unusual and half completely regular.
Meaningnot established
Not established
No origin is documented. The name belongs to the American tradition of building from a prefix and an ending, and the Tw- front appears to have been chosen precisely because almost nothing else used it. Separately, the Twana are a Coast Salish people of the Hood Canal region in Washington State, whose name is their own and has nothing to do with the American given name. That is a collision of spellings rather than a source, and it should not be offered as an etymology.
Pronouncing Twana
TWAH-nuh
TWAH-nuh, two syllables, stress at the front, the first vowel open. Some say TWAN-uh with a shorter vowel. There is no competing reading of the consonants — tw- says exactly what it looks like, which is one advantage of using a rare letter pair.
Nicknames for Twana
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
- 1938
- Most girls named
- 1974119 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1008reached in 1974
- Change vs 1995
- −37.5%5 in 2025, from 8
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.
Twanas among us
people named Twana are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 321,453 born in 2025 was named Twana
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 Marna test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Twana's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Marna climbed just as high around 1947, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Marna's path sketches the road Twana is walking now.
Twana 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
Twana beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Twana in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The tw- front is genuinely rare, so the name registers as distinctive without being difficult.
- Ana works as a short form and needs no explanation to anyone.
- Two syllables, phonetically obvious, and easy against almost any surname.
- Twanna, Twanda and Twyla are all close enough to be substituted, and the doubled-n spelling especially.
- There is no documented meaning, which is worth deciding how to talk about in advance.
- The name belongs to a specific stretch of the last century and reads as of that period.
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Twana
Feminine · #14942 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Twanas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 2,000 people named Twana are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Twana in 2025?
- Twana ranks #14942 among US girl names in 2025, with 5 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Twana?
- About 1 in every 321,453 US girls born in 2025 was named Twana — 5 in all.
- Will my child share the name Twana with classmates?
- Twana will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Twana
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Hester#14942 · Lyda#14942 · Zula#14942 · Zona#14942 · Ula#14942 · Belva#14942 · Lucetta#14942 · Leala#14942
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Twana? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Twana and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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