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Hedda

Girls' name

Diminutive of Hedvig

Hedda has been given to 222 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 1943, with 13 recorded.

Babies named Hedda, 2007

1 in 666,000

Hedda over time, 1880–2025

Girls
05101518801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Hedda: meaning, origin, and history

Diminutive of Hedvig

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Hedda means

Hedda is a diminutive of Hedvig.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Hedda is used in Norwegian and Swedish.

Another recorded pronunciation is /ˈhɛd.dɑ/ for Hedda.

Origin, language, and formation

Hedda is used in Icelandic and Norwegian.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Hedvig.

Pronunciation and spelling

In Icelandic, Hedda is pronounced [ˈhɛt(ː)a].

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 222 girls were recorded with the name Hedda between 1900 and 2007. Its highest annual count was 13 in 1943; its best national rank was #2,048 in 1900.

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 Hedda?

Hedda had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2007, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2007
1 in 666,000
6 of 3,997,748 births
Among girls only
1 in 320,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2007
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
461,839 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Hedda 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 2007 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 461,839 children born in 2007 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Hedda. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Heddas were born

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

Median birth year
1946
About 79 years old
Biggest decade
1940s
41.9% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
2.7%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
89
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1940s — 41.9% of all recorded uses (93).

Is Hedda 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 1943 (13)
Years since peak
82
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
25.3% average annual change
Best rank ever
#2,048
1900

Spellings of Hedda

Hedda is not the most common spelling — Edna is, with 43.1% against Hedda's 0.03%.

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 Hedda is used

Across 1910–2025, Hedda was most concentrated in New York — about 1 in — girls, against 1 in 463,200 across all states with data.

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1New York1 in —

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. Hedda has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Hedda around the world

Where Hedda 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.

  • France
    2019–2025
    #5,729
    in 2025
  • Norway
    1880–2025
    #9
    in 2025
  • South Australia
    1984–1986
    #667
    in 1986

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques, Statistics Norway and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. SSB, CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Hedda 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
#2,048
1900
Peak year
1943
13 that year
First recorded
1900
Last recorded
2007
All-time count
222
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Hedda

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

HeddyHediHedayaHedyEddaNeddaJaddaHedvigSiddaAddaHeddieHedwigHedieHeditFreddaHediehHedwigeYeddaRhonddaFridda

Sibling names for Hedda

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 Hedda

Top names of 1943, Hedda's peak yearThe 1940s in fullOther names that peaked in 1900Girls' names starting with HNorwegian Girl Names