Valentina
Feminine · “strong”
Valentina is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 65,147 girls against 19 boys since 1880.
Valentina comes from the Roman family of names built on valens, and it has been spoken in Italy, Spain, Portugal, Russia and across Latin America for centuries without needing to change a single letter. Five syllables in some mouths, four in others, it moves easily between languages — and it belonged to the first woman to fly in space, the Russian cosmonaut Valentina Tereshkova.
How old is the name Valentina?
Valentina first appears in US birth records in 1897 — 128 years ago. The typical Valentina is a kid of about 7 — this name's wave is very recent. About 63,500 people named Valentina are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Valentina most popular?
Valentina peaked in 2025, reaching #35 nationally. Today it ranks #35, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Valentina appears on these lists:
- Long and elegant: names with room to breathe
- Distinctly American names
- America's top 100 names right now
- Gorgeous — and about to be everywhere
- Names at their all-time peak, right now
- Four-syllable names that carry
- all guides
Works in Spanish & Latino and Italian families too:
Where it comes from
From Valens to Valentina
The story of Valentina
The Roman cognomen Valens gave rise to Valentinus, and Valentina is its feminine form. The masculine line produced Saint Valentine, the third-century Roman martyr whose February feast day later attached itself to courtship, which helped carry the whole family of names through medieval Europe. Valentina took deepest root in Italy, Spain and the Slavic world, where it has been in steady use for generations, and it traveled to the Americas with Italian and Spanish speakers. Its rise in the United States has come largely through Spanish-speaking families, and the name's strongest showing is in California, Texas and Florida.
Meaning
strong, healthy, vigorous
From Latin valens, the present participle of valere, 'to be strong' or 'to be well' — the same root behind English words like valiant and convalesce.
Cultural footprint
Valentina Tereshkova (b. 1937) — First woman in space
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- Valens
- Valentinus
- Valentina
Related forms: Valentina · Valentina · Валентина · Valentine · Valentina · Valentine
Pronouncing Valentina
val-en-TEE-nuh
The stress falls on the third syllable in every language that uses the name. Spanish and Italian speakers give the final vowel a fuller -nah; English speakers usually soften it to -nuh. Both are correct and neither will cause confusion.
Nicknames for Valentina
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
- 1897
- Most girls named
- 20255,354 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #35reached in 2025
- Change vs 2023
- +30.9%5,354 in 2025, from 4,090
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.
Valentina in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Valentina in Italian — same name
- Valentina in Spanish — same name
- Валентина in Russian — transliteration
- Valentine in French — related form
- Valentina in Romanian — same name
- Valentine in English — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida. INSEE rounds every published count to the nearest five for statistical confidentiality; the ranks are calculated from the exact figures. International figures from INSEE. Sources
Valentinas among us
people named Valentina are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 300 born in 2025 was named Valentina
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 Jane test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Valentina's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Jane climbed just as high around 1946, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Jane's path sketches the road Valentina is walking now.
Valentina is climbing fast right now. Steep climbs tend to come with steep descents — the quicker a name arrives, the more firmly it belongs to its moment.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Valentina is headed
Valentina should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High 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.
Valentina beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Valentina in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled and pronounced the same way in Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian and Russian — one of the few names that needs no adjustment when it crosses a border.
- A documented Latin meaning, 'strong, healthy', with no competing readings.
- Several established short forms already in circulation: Val, Vale and Tina, ranging from crisp to affectionate.
- Centuries of unbroken use in Europe behind it, so it arrives with a record rather than as an experiment.
- Charts in France as well as the United States, so it is familiar to more than one audience.
- It is climbing quickly in the US. A child born now may find the name much more familiar to her classmates by the time she is in high school than it is today.
- The Valentine's Day link is affectionate but permanent, and February brings it up every year — some bearers enjoy this and some tire of it.
- English speakers occasionally reach for Valerie or Valentine on first hearing, so a small correction now and then is likely.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Valentina to the vote.
Add it to a family vote or a couple’s swipe deck — the other person gets one card, a simple answer and room to say why. No app, no account for them.
Only the people you invite can see your list.
Already decided on Valentina? Hide it among decoys and let them guess.
What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Valentina
Feminine · #35 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Valentinas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 63,500 people named Valentina are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Valentina in 2025?
- Valentina ranks #35 among US girl names in 2025, with 5,354 babies given the name.
- How common is the name Valentina?
- About 1 in every 300 US girls born in 2025 was named Valentina — 5,354 in all.
- Will my child share the name Valentina with classmates?
- Valentina will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Valentina
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Layla#36 · Emily#34 · Avery#37 · Gianna#33 · Scarlett#32 · Grace#38 · Ivy#39 · Zoe#31
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Valentina? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Valentina and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
Compare side by sideIn a hurry? Just pick a winner — one tap, no sign-up, and you see how everyone else voted.
Or jump into a head-to-head
Weighing a whole shortlist? Add the rest in the builder, or settle it with a bracket.
Cast your vote
Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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