Name Awesome

Modesta

Girls' name

Modest, through Modesto

Modesta has been given to 1,615 babies in the U.S. since 1890. 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 1926, with 41 recorded.

Babies named Modesta, 2024

1 in 478,000

Modesta over time, 1880–2025

Girls
020406018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Modesta: meaning, origin, and history

Modest, through Modesto

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Modesta means

Modesta belongs to the name family reached through Modesta → Modesto. Its meaning is “modest”.

Origin, language, and formation

Modesta is used in Albanian, Latin and Spanish.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Modestus and Modesto.

Pronunciation and spelling

In Latin, Modesta is pronounced [mɔˈdɛs.ta].

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 1,615 girls were recorded with the name Modesta between 1890 and 2024. Its highest annual count was 41 in 1926; its best national rank was #1,190 in 1909.

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 Modesta?

Modesta 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 478,000
7 of 3,342,801 births
Among girls only
1 in 231,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2024
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
331,009 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Modesta 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 331,009 children born in 2024 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Modesta. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Modestas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Modesta was born before 1940 — so the typical Modesta is around 85 today.

Median birth year
1940
About 85 years old
Biggest decade
1930s
17.3% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
5.0%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
625
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1930s — 17.3% of all recorded uses (279).

Is Modesta 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 1926 (41)
Years since peak
99
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
35.4% average annual change
Best rank ever
#1,190
1909

Spellings of Modesta

Modesta is not the most common spelling — Odessa is, with 80.2% against Modesta's 7.0%.

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 Modesta is used

Across 1910–2025, Modesta was most concentrated in Texas — about 1 in 20,000 girls, against 1 in 65,660 across all states with data. It was least common in New York (1 in —).

05 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Texas1 in 20,000
  2. 2New Mexico1 in 50,000
  3. 3California1 in —
  4. 4New 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. Modesta has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Modesta around the world

Where Modesta 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
    1919–1935
    #920
    in 1935

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0.

Modesta 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
#1,190
1909
Peak year
1926
41 that year
First recorded
1890
Last recorded
2024
All-time count
1,615
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Modesta

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

ModestyKalistaCallistaKallistaCelestaCalistaModenaShastaCrystaKalystaChrystaAugustaModeanCalystaVlastaModeneModellCristaAristaChristaModelleModineLacostaErnesta

Sibling names for Modesta

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 Modesta

Top names of 1926, Modesta's peak yearThe 1920s in fullOther names that peaked in 1909Girls' names starting with M