Vanja

Spellings & scripts●

Locally spelled Ваня in BG Bulgaria, RU Russia, UA Ukraine and 2 more, Vanya in ES Spain, GB United Kingdom, PL Poland and Vania in IT Italy.

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●

Attested across 11 languages in the etymology graph.

Languages●

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◐

Vanja is also recorded as 2 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

• Russian given name21K records spelled Vanja36 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan

  Languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Uzbek

  Also written Ваня, Vanya, Vania, Ваниа, Ванья

• Portuguese given name17K records spelled Vanja3 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Brazil, Serbia, United States, Spain

  Languages: Portuguese, Spanish

  Also written Vånjä

43 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●

Vanja 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 Swedish, Vanja är ursprungligen en smekform till det ryska → Ivan. Namnet var således från början ett mansnamn men har i Norden kommit att uppfattas som ett kvinnonamn på grund av ändelsen -a (jfr → Anna, → Greta, → Carla). I den rikssvenska almanackan 24 maj.

  as a name·Förnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon

• In German, weibl. Vom., schwedische oder italie­ nische Form von

  as a name·DUDEN Lexikon der Vornamen

• Scandinavian: from the Russian name VANYA , but used as a girl's name because in the Scandinavian languages the ending - a is typical of female names.

  as a word

• In Norwegian, a female given name, occasionally also given to men

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In men, fringe, tassel. Va njésia, borders

  as a word·Vocabulary of the Mende Language

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●

NO SSB — Navn (1880–present) — 61 years between 1953–2019. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.

Notable people with this name●

• Vanja Blombergb. 1929SESwedish artistic gymnast
• Vanya Voynovab. 1934BGnot in their usual namebasketball player (1934.–1993.)
• Vanja Bulićb. 1947RSSerbian writer and journalist
• Vanja Cernjulb. 1968HRCroatian cinematographer
• Ivanab. 1969BGnot in their usual nameBulgarian female singer
• Vania Millánb. 1978ESnot in their usual nameSpanish model
• Vanja Udovičićb. 1982RSSerbian politician and water polo player
• Vanja Milinković-Savićb. 1997RSSerbian footballer (born 1997)
• Vanja Marinkovićb. 1997RSSerbian basketball player (born 1997)
• Vanja Drkušićb. 1999SISlovenian association football 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●

Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 491 rows in the corpus for this spelling.

Frequently asked questions

How common is the name Vanja?

We estimate roughly 142 thousand people bear Vanja (counting its spellings and scripts) across 12 countries in our records.

In which country does Vanja have the most bearers?

We estimate about 125 thousand people bear Vanja in Brazil, more than in any other country in our records, where it is most often spelled vanja.

How common is Vanja compared with other names?

In Montenegro, Vanja is the 94th most common given name of 834 given names recorded there.

Is Vanja a male or female name?

Vanja 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 Vanja mean?

Recorded meaning: Slavonic; usually a form of Ivan or John