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Marija

Girls' name

Form of Maria

Marija has been given to 519 babies in the U.S. since 1962. 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 2008, with 21 recorded.

Babies named Marija, 2024

1 in 669,000

Marija over time, 1880–2025

Girls
010203018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Marija: meaning, origin, and history

Form of Maria

Latin, Ancient Greek, Aramaic, Sicilian and Hebrew

What Marija means

Marija is a form of Maria.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Marija is used in Croatian, Slovene, Serbian, Macedonian, Lithuanian, Latvian and Maltese.

Another recorded pronunciation is /ˈmǎ.ri.ja/, /ma.ˈríː.ja/, /ˈma.ri.ja/, /mɐ.rʲɪ.ˈjɐ/ and /ma.ˈriː.ja/ for Marija.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Marija → Maria → Maria → מרים. The family’s proposed meaning is “to be bitter”, recorded in Hebrew with the source elements m-r-r.

Origin, language, and formation

Marija is used in English, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Serbo-Croatian and Slovene. Its origins include Latin, Ancient Greek, Aramaic, Sicilian and Hebrew.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Maria, Мария, Marie, Mary and Merjem.

Pronunciation and spelling

In Maltese, Marija is pronounced /maˈriː.ja/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 519 girls were recorded with the name Marija between 1962 and 2024. Its highest annual count was 21 in 2008; its best national rank was #4,267 in 1976.

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 Marija?

Marija had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2024, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2024
1 in 669,000
5 of 3,342,801 births
Among girls only
1 in 324,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2024
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
463,412 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Marija 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 2024 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 463,412 children born in 2024 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Marija. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Marijas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Marija was born before 1996 — so the typical Marija is around 29 today.

Median birth year
1996
About 29 years old
Biggest decade
2000s
23.9% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
42.8%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
519
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

2000s — 23.9% of all recorded uses (124).

Is Marija 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 2008 (21)
Years since peak
17
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
52.6% average annual change
Best rank ever
#4,267
1976

Spellings of Marija

Marija is not the most common spelling — Maria is, with 17.6% against Marija's 0.02%.

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 Marija is used

Across 1910–2025, Marija was most concentrated in Illinois — about 1 in — girls, against 1 in 662,502 across all states with data.

00 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Illinois1 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. Marija has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Marija around the world

Where Marija 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.

  • England & Wales
    2000–2024
    #5,892
    in 2024
  • Northern Ireland
    2019–2019
    #424
    in 2019
  • Ireland
    2006–2021
    #883
    in 2021
  • France
    1970–2023
    #4,220
    in 2023
  • Norway
    1880–2024
    #478
    in 2024
  • Canada
    1991–2019
    #2,941
    in 2019
  • South Australia
    1946–2012
    #871
    in 2012

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics, Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency, Central Statistics Office, Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques, Statistics Norway, Statistics Canada and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). ONS, NISRA data under Open Government Licence v3.0. CSO, SSB, CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence.

Marija 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
#4,267
1976
Peak year
2008
21 that year
First recorded
1962
Last recorded
2024
All-time count
519
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Marija

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

MarwahMarleiMaryumMarilyMarayaMarineMarjanMareliMariemMarellaMartieMaryanaMaryamaMarenaMariluzMarleahMareaMarikoMarienMarakiMariferMarleniMarayahMaral

Sibling names for Marija

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 Marija

Top names of 2008, Marija's peak yearThe 2000s in fullOther names that peaked in 1976Girls' names starting with MCroatian & Serbian Girl NamesMary Variations & NicknamesSlovenian Girl Names