Janaka
given name · Hindi · Latin script
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Janaka is a given name, most frequently recorded in India. In Sri Lanka it is the 26th most common given name. It appears chiefly in Hindi and Sinhala, written in the Latin script. Recorded meaning: King of Mithilā; a previous birth of the Bodhisatta, whose story is in the Mahā Janaka Jātaka (J.i.268; J.vi.59).
- LKSri Lanka1 in 647◐
- INIndia1 in 9.1K
- USUnited States1 in 415K
carrying the name, one hue, darker where it is more common. Hover a country for its figure.
- ≈876 ●
- 2 ●
- Sources
- 149 ●
- 1 in 255K ◐
across 5 countries
recorded for this name
351K records
Official registry-verified
Sweden
Spellings & scripts●
4 other spellings are counted as the same name:
Locally spelled Janaki in IN India, US United States, MY Malaysia and 17 more and Jonaki in BD Bangladesh.
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records; ○ marks a model's transliteration. Click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin●
King of Mithilā; a previous birth of the Bodhisatta, whose story is in the Mahā Janaka Jātaka (J.i.268; J.vi.59).
Sources 1
- Dictionary of Pali Proper Names Vol I (A-Dh)
Where in the world●
Sorted by bearers counted by national registers, records where none counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IN India | — | 359,461 | 340K rec. | — | 441 | Janaki | 134 |
| LK Sri Lanka | #26 | 2,211 | 5.7K rec. | — | — | Janaka | 81 |
| US United States | — | 802 | 3.2K rec. | 1 in 415K | 802 | Janaki | 149 |
| MY Malaysia | — | 624 | 568 rec. | — | — | Janaki | 15 |
| BD Bangladesh | — | 417 | 452 rec. | — | — | Jonaki | 19 |
| GB United Kingdom | — | 387 | 178 rec. | — | listed | Janaka | 41 |
| IT Italy | — | 122 | 150 rec. | — | — | Janaka | 12 |
| CA Canada | — | 102 | 97 rec. | — | — | Janaka | 19 |
| SG Singapore | — | 95 | 114 rec. | — | — | Janaki | 10 |
| FR France | — | 87 | 89 rec. | — | — | Janaki | 34 |
| AE United Arab Emirates | — | 80 | 36 rec. | — | — | Janaki | 19 |
| FI Finland | — | 70 | 0 rec. | — | 35 | Janaki | 1 |
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table. How that works.
Languages●
- Hindi9.5K52%
- Sinhala3.6K20%
- English2.2K12%
- 4392%
- Arabic3902%
Show as table
| Name | Records | Note |
|---|---|---|
| Hindi | 9,508 | 52% |
| Sinhala | 3,608 | 20% |
| English | 2,153 | 12% |
| 439 | 2% | |
| Arabic | 390 | 2% |
Language is read off each record's context, not declared by the bearer; a share is of all records for this spelling.
Other recorded senses●
Janaka is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In pi, King of Mithilā, a previous birth of the Bodhisatta.’ For his story, see the Mahā Janaka Jātaka. i J. i. 268; J. vi. 59.
as a nameDictionary of Pali Proper Names Vol I (A-Dh)
In pi, King of Benares.1 H is minister was Senaka, whose story is related in the Sattubhasta Jātaka.
as a nameDictionary of Pali Proper Names Vol I (A-Dh)
producing; causing; progenitor; father.
as a nameThe Penguin book of Hindu names for boys
aking of Videha (8); Aghora (४); Dattatreya
as a nameSunama Sarit (Hindi) Ten Thousand Sanskrit Names
knower.
as a nameThe Penguin book of Hindu names for boys
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Over time●
Show as table
| Year | records |
|---|---|
| 1899 | 1 |
| 1913 | 1 |
| 1914 | 2 |
| 1916 | 1 |
| 1917 | 1 |
| 1919 | 1 |
| 1922 | 1 |
| 1923 | 1 |
| 1924 | 1 |
| 1927 | 4 |
| 1928 | 7 |
| 1929 | 27 |
| 1930 | 5 |
| 1931 | 14 |
| 1932 | 33 |
| 1933 | 11 |
| 1934 | 60 |
| 1935 | 15 |
| 1936 | 28 |
| 1937 | 25 |
| 1938 | 17 |
| 1939 | 71 |
| 1940 | 18 |
| 1941 | 32 |
| 1942 | 36 |
| 1943 | 25 |
| 1944 | 97 |
| 1945 | 27 |
| 1946 | 64 |
| 1947 | 35 |
| 1948 | 43 |
| 1949 | 86 |
| 1950 | 21 |
| 1951 | 37 |
| 1952 | 65 |
| 1953 | 16 |
| 1954 | 97 |
| 1955 | 26 |
| 1956 | 57 |
| 1957 | 41 |
| 1958 | 38 |
| 1959 | 72 |
| 1960 | 49 |
| 1961 | 48 |
| 1962 | 74 |
| 1963 | 32 |
| 1964 | 103 |
| 1965 | 26 |
| 1966 | 78 |
| 1967 | 45 |
| 1968 | 34 |
| 1969 | 65 |
| 1970 | 49 |
| 1971 | 23 |
| 1972 | 44 |
| 1973 | 21 |
| 1974 | 10 |
| 1975 | 17 |
| 1976 | 13 |
| 1977 | 11 |
| 1978 | 14 |
| 1979 | 11 |
| 1980 | 6 |
| 1981 | 9 |
| 1982 | 5 |
| 1983 | 6 |
| 1984 | 4 |
| 1985 | 5 |
| 1986 | 9 |
| 1987 | 6 |
| 1988 | 2 |
| 1990 | 1 |
| 1991 | 3 |
| 1992 | 1 |
| 1994 | 1 |
| 2010 | 4 |
| 2014 | 1 |
IN naampy — India given names from state electoral rolls (in-rolls) — 77 years between 1899–2014. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.
Notable people with this name●
- Subhash Janaka de Silvab. 1972LKbadminton player
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence●
Attested in 13 sources across 6 countries.
Reference works 1
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 94 rows in the corpus for this spelling.
Frequently asked questions
- How common is the name Janaka?
- We estimate roughly 876 people bear Janaka (counting its spellings and scripts) across 5 countries in our records.
- In which country does Janaka have the most bearers?
- Janaka is most frequently recorded in India, where it is most often spelled janaki.
- How common is Janaka compared with other names?
- In Sri Lanka, Janaka is the 26th most common given name of 11,905 given names recorded there.
- Is Janaka a male or female name?
- Janaka is a female name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- What does the name Janaka mean?
- Recorded meaning: King of Mithilā; a previous birth of the Bodhisatta, whose story is in the Mahā Janaka Jātaka (J.i.268; J.vi.59).
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/janakaThe same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. Rate-limited for casual use. Bulk access and licensing.
About this data
Data snapshot . Figures are rebuilt periodically and will change.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Janaka” — the 26th most common given name in Sri Lanka. Data snapshot 2026-09-12.