Maria

given name · Portuguese · Latin script

Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise

Maria is a given name, most frequently recorded in Argentina, where it is the most common given name. It appears chiefly in Portuguese and Spanish, written in the Latin script. Recorded meaning: from Latin Maria, biblical name of Hebrew origin, traditionally linked to Miriam.

rarermore common
  • CUCuba1 in 12◐
  • GTGuatemala1 in 14
  • PYParaguay1 in 16

carrying the name, one hue, darker where it is more common. Hover a country for its figure.

≈21M ●

across 12 countries

#1 ●

of 16M given names

11 ●

recorded for this name

Sources
621 ●

138M records

Official registry-verified

1 in 16 ◐

Paraguay

Spellings & scripts●

MariaLatin · Portuguese●99M records
МарияCyrillic · Russian●14M records
ΜαριαGreek · Greek●1.3M records
מריםHebrew · Hebrew●617K records
ᲛარიამGeorgian · Georgian●167K records
มาเรียมThai · Thai●10K records
ՄարիաArmenian · Armenian●1.6K records
마리아Hangul · Korean●576 records
ማርታEthiopic · Amharic●386 records
ମାରିଆOdia · Odia●1 records
ਮਾਰੀਆGurmukhi · Punjabi●0 records

16 other spellings are counted as the same name:

Locally spelled Mary in US United States, GB United Kingdom, PH Philippines and 3 more, Мария in RU Russia, BG Bulgaria, Marie in FR France and Марія in UA Ukraine.

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●

from Latin Maria, biblical name of Hebrew origin, traditionally linked to Miriam

Sources 1

  • Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

Attested across 9 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world●

Sorted by bearers counted by national registers, records where none counts.

Where Maria is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
AR Argentina#129,055,10115M rec.—5.3KMaria238
MX Mexico#116,588,91013M rec.—3.6KMaria286
RU Russia#2013,583,3964.3M rec.—#4Мария226
BR Brazil#112,284,478△3.3M rec.1 in 1712MMaria298
VE Venezuela#29,100,5883.1M rec.—9.1KMaria169
UA Ukraine#68,811,6198.8M rec.—listedМарія103
PE Peru#16,900,6954.2M rec.—928KMaria176
CL Chile#13,591,476221K rec.—1.2KMaria215
GB United Kingdom#32,995,9352.9M rec.—1.6KMary285
PH Philippines#12,614,1132.4M rec.—27KMary205
GT Guatemala#22,530,600295K rec.—3.1KMaría131
CO Colombia#12,353,970834K rec.—267Maria269

Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table. How that works.

Languages●

  • Portuguese99M39%
  • Spanish94M37%
  • English27M11%
  • Polish4.9M2%
  • Hungarian3.6M1%
Show as table
Languages in which the name is recorded
NameRecordsNote
Portuguese98,861,87539%
Spanish94,432,47337%
English27,118,00811%
Polish4,854,1982%
Hungarian3,625,8801%

Language is read off each record's context, not declared by the bearer; a share is of all records for this spelling.

Other names spelled this way◐

Maria is also recorded as 5 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • a separate given name3.3M records spelled Maria17 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Ecuador, United Kingdom, Spain

    Also written María, Mária, Mariâ, Marià, Mariá

  • Swahili given name180K records spelled Maria7 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, South Africa, Spain, Tanzania

    Languages: Swahili, Southern Sotho, Kinyarwanda

    Also written María, Mária, Marìa

  • Vietnamese given name104K records spelled Maria25 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Spain, United States, Vietnam, Italy

    Languages: Vietnamese, Khmer

    Also written María, Mariya, Mária, Marìa, Marïa

  • a separate given name27K records spelled Maria51 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Norway, Sweden, Spain

    Also written María, Mariä, Màrîä, M̶a̶r̶i̶a, M̶a̶r̶i̶a̶

  • English (Trinidad & Tobago) given name12K records spelled Maria2 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Trinidad & Tobago, Chile

    Also written María

155 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Other recorded senses●

Maria 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 Vietnamese, Vietnamese form of Mary; title used for the Virgin Mary in Catholic usage.

    as a nameTên Họ Người Việt Nam

  • In English, Hebrew; bitter; wanted child; also the star of the sea

    as a nameBaby names, 25,350 baby names nicknames for your family, friends pets, including the top 100 names, 2,000 most popular…

  • In German, from Hebrew Miryam; source of Miez(e), Miesekatze

    as a nameDeutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

  • In Irish, Latin form of Mary; sometimes used in Ireland.

    as a nameIrish first names

  • from the female personal name, Latin Maria, which arose as a back-formation from the early Christian female name Mariam. This was mistaken for an accusative case, with the usual Latin feminine accusative ending -am, but in fact it is an Aramaic form of the Hebrew name Miryam (see Marie).

    as a nameDictionary of American Family Names

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●

05K10K15K19001950200010K · 1964

Show as table
Maria in SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present), United States, 1880–2025
Yearrecords
1880125
1881120
1882121
1883141
1884190
1885175
1886180
1887203
1888239
1889238
1890247
1891248
1892301
1893255
1894309
1895295
1896312
1897304
1898329
1899266
1900389
1901350
1902331
1903379
1904393
1905430
1906388
1907490
1908480
1909544
1910621
1911646
1912828
1913909
19141,117
19151,286
19161,261
19171,441
19181,544
19191,678
19201,935
19212,028
19221,929
19232,000
19242,291
19252,360
19262,352
19272,592
19282,565
19292,532
19302,540
19312,185
19322,045
19331,862
19341,990
19351,995
19361,981
19371,953
19382,012
19392,077
19402,135
19412,470
19422,817
19432,863
19443,361
19453,313
19463,960
19474,712
19484,817
19495,123
19505,076
19515,236
19525,695
19535,992
19546,590
19556,210
19566,733
19576,778
19586,899
19597,249
19607,535
19617,947
19629,089
19639,854
196410,148
19659,480
19669,132
19678,878
19688,386
19698,401
19708,686
19718,141
19727,721
19737,667
19747,804
19757,542
19767,358
19777,094
19787,021
19797,339
19807,875
19817,681
19827,348
19836,847
19846,136
19856,013
19866,142
19875,678
19885,713
19896,345
19907,186
19917,136
19927,091
19936,978
19946,753
19957,003
19967,598
19977,314
19986,817
19997,035
20006,857
20016,842
20026,391
20036,091
20045,757
20055,600
20065,604
20075,129
20084,593
20094,143
20103,421
20113,221
20123,034
20132,821
20142,777
20152,833
20162,812
20172,717
20182,621
20192,717
20202,493
20212,604
20222,849
20232,907
20243,122
20252,887

US SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) — 146 years between 1880–2025. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.

Notable people with this name●

1700180019002000Maria Theresa of Austria, b. 1717Leopold II of Belgium, b. 1835Vittorio Emanuele III, b. 1869Maria Montessori, b. 1870Franz von Papen, b. 1879Corazon Aquino, b. 1933Sonia Sotomayor, b. 1954Halle Berry, b. 1966Steffi Graf, b. 1969Maria Sharapova, b. 1987
  • Maria Theresa of Austriab. 1717ATruler of the Habsburg Dominions (1717-1780)
  • Leopold II of Belgiumb. 1835BEnot in their usual nameKing of the Belgians from 1865 to 1909 (1835–1909)
  • Vittorio Emanuele IIIb. 1869ITnot in their usual nameKing of Italy from 1900 to 1946
  • Maria Montessorib. 1870ITItalian physician and educator (1870-1952)
  • Franz von Papenb. 1879DEnot in their usual nameGerman general staff officer, politician, diplomat, nobleman and Chancellor of Germany (1879–1969)
  • Corazon Aquinob. 1933PHnot in their usual namePresident of the Philippines from 1986 to 1992
  • Sonia Sotomayorb. 1954USnot in their usual nameUS Supreme Court justice since 2009
  • Halle Berryb. 1966USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress (born 1966)
  • Steffi Grafb. 1969DEnot in their usual nameGerman tennis player
  • Maria Sharapovab. 1987RURussian tennis 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 193 sources across 100 countries.

Official registers attesting Maria
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
BR BrazilIBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror)202212M—
BR BrazilIBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname)—12M#1
BR BrazilIBGE — Nomes (census name API)—12M#5
BR BrazilIBGE — Nomes no Brasil API (Census 2010 + 2022)—12M#1
PL Polanddane.gov.pl — PESEL given names (first + second name position, 2026-01-20)20261.8M#1
US United StatesCensus Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex20201.6M#8
EC EcuadorINEC — civil registry names20241M#1
BR BrazilIBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname)2020571K—
ES SpainINE — Nombres más frecuentes (Padrón Municipal)—569K#2
PL Polanddane.gov.pl — PESEL living persons (names)—567K#4
ES SpainINE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos)—543K#3
SE SwedenSkatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population)—445K#1

Reference works 8

  • Dictionary of American Family Names
  • The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
  • Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
  • Nişanyan Adlar (Turkish given-name national-registry frequency)
  • Wikipedia given-name tokens
  • Wikipedia surname tokens
  • Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
  • jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)

These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.

Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 2,531 rows in the corpus for this spelling.

Frequently asked questions

How common is the name Maria?
We estimate roughly 21 million people bear Maria (counting its spellings and scripts) across 12 countries in our records.
In which country does Maria have the most bearers?
Maria is most frequently recorded in Argentina, where it is most often spelled maria.
How common is Maria compared with other names?
In Argentina, Maria is the most common given name of 517,176 given names recorded there.
Is Maria a male or female name?
Maria 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 Maria mean?
Recorded meaning: from Latin Maria, biblical name of Hebrew origin, traditionally linked to Miriam
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/maria

The 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

● measured from records◐ inferred from the name graph○ machine-generated

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, “Maria” — the most common given name in Argentina. Data snapshot 2026-09-12.

See how Maria parses inside a full name →