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Bernita

Girls' name

Literal meaning not recorded

Bernita has been given to 4,630 babies in the U.S. since 1900. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1954, with 117 recorded.

Babies named Bernita, 2000

1 in 756,000

Bernita over time, 1880–2025

Girls
05010015018801900192019401960198020002020

Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Bernita: meaning, origin, and history

Literal meaning not recorded

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Bernita means

Bernita is a given name.

Origin, language, and formation

Bernita is used in English.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 4,630 girls were recorded with the name Bernita between 1900 and 2000. Its highest annual count was 117 in 1954; its best national rank was #689 in 1933.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Bernita?

Bernita had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2000, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2000
1 in 756,000
5 of 3,778,496 births
Among girls only
1 in 363,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2000
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
523,812 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Bernita sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Olivia (13,544)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 2000 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 523,812 children born in 2000 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Bernita. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Bernitas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Bernita was born before 1946 — so the typical Bernita is around 79 today.

Median birth year
1946
About 79 years old
Biggest decade
1950s
18.8% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
7.0%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
2,126
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1950s — 18.8% of all recorded uses (871).

Is Bernita rising or falling?

Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.

Rank vs 1 year ago
—
Not ranked then
Rank vs 5 years ago
New entry
Not ranked then
Rank vs 10 years ago
—
Not ranked then
Births vs 10 years ago
—
Not published both years
Share of its own peak
0%
Peak was 1954 (117)
Years since peak
71
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
31.8% average annual change
Best rank ever
#689
1933

Spellings of Bernita

Bernita is not the most common spelling — Bernice is, with 64.1% against Bernita's 1.6%.

Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.

Where Bernita is used

Across 1910–2025, Bernita was most concentrated in Kansas — about 1 in 9,091 girls, against 1 in 84,104 across all states with data. It was least common in Virginia (1 in —).

011 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Kansas1 in 9,091
  2. 2Iowa1 in 11,111
  3. 3Illinois1 in 25,000
  4. 4Nebraska1 in 33,333
  5. 5South Dakota1 in 33,333
  6. 6Georgia1 in 50,000
  7. 7Louisiana1 in 50,000
  8. 8Michigan1 in 50,000

Shading is the share of that state's recorded girls given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Bernita has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Bernita around the world

Where Bernita ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.

  • South Australia
    1951–2000
    #727
    in 2000

Popularity data from Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Bernita by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#689
1933
Peak year
1954
117 that year
First recorded
1900
Last recorded
2000
All-time count
4,630
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Bernita

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

BerkleyBerkleeBereniceBerkeleyBerlinBertieBertaSaritaMaritaAdelitaBerneitaBerlynnLanitaLupitaBerylTeresitaJovitaBerlynBerneiceRositaCarlitaBernettaClaritaBertina

Names with a curve like Bernita

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Bernita, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

DarlineLavernVernettaDorineDeloraGeorgettaChristeneLauretteJohnnyKathernLorrettaDoretha

Sibling names for Bernita

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Bernita

Top names of 1954, Bernita's peak yearThe 1950s in fullOther names that peaked in 1933Girls' names starting with B