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Nita

#12,823 in 2025Girls' name

Multiple documented origins; meaning depends on tradition

Nita has been given to 14,268 babies in the U.S. since 1881. In 2025 it ranked #12,823 of 17,293 girls’ names in use. Its peak year was 1956, with 403 recorded.

Babies named Nita, 2025

1 in 474,000

Nita over time, 1880–2025

Girls
020040060018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Nita: meaning, origin, and history

Multiple documented origins; meaning depends on tradition

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Nita means

Nita has more than one naming route in the cited origin entries: distinct naming traditions.

The naming story behind Nita

A separate documented entry treats Nita as a short form of Anita. That is a personal-name relationship, which differs from translating the letters of the modern spelling into one universal English word. The linked origin entry identifies the context of this relationship.

One of the source’s documented entries for Nita records a meaning of bear.

Origin, language, and formation

Nita is used in Faroese and Finnish.

Pronunciation and spelling

In Finnish, Nita is pronounced /ˈnitɑ/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 14,268 girls were recorded with the name Nita between 1881 and 2025. Its highest annual count was 403 in 1956; its best national rank was #432 in 1895.

Over 5 years its rank fell, from #10,863 in 2020 to #12,823 in 2025. Over 10 years its rank fell, from #8,806 in 2015 to #12,823 in 2025.

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 Nita?

Everything below is computed from the 2025 data — the most recent year available.

Among all babies, 2025
1 in 474,000
7 of 3,315,165 births
Among girls only
1 in 230,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2025
#12,823
of 17,293 girls’ names in use
Coin-flip room size
328,272 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Nita 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 2025 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 328,272 children born in 2025 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Nita. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Nitas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Nita was born before 1949 — so the typical Nita is around 76 today.

Median birth year
1949
About 76 years old
Biggest decade
1950s
24.2% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
2.2%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
7,124
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1950s — 24.2% of all recorded uses (3,451).

Is Nita 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
−2,772
Places dropped
Rank vs 5 years ago
−1,960
Places dropped
Rank vs 10 years ago
−4,017
Places dropped
Births vs 10 years ago
0.54×
Fewer babies than then
Share of its own peak
1.7%
Peak was 1956 (403)
Years since peak
69
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
35.4% average annual change
Best rank ever
#432
1895

Spellings of Nita

Nita is not the most common spelling — Lisa is, with 23.8% against Nita's 0.35%.

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 Nita is used

Across 1910–2025, Nita was most concentrated in Oklahoma — about 1 in 3,333 girls, against 1 in 15,710 across all states with data. It was least common in Wisconsin (1 in —).

030 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Oklahoma1 in 3,333
  2. 2Louisiana1 in 4,348
  3. 3Arkansas1 in 4,545
  4. 4Mississippi1 in 5,556
  5. 5Texas1 in 5,882
  6. 6Alabama1 in 9,091
  7. 7Tennessee1 in 10,000
  8. 8Georgia1 in 14,286

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

Nita around the world

Where Nita 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
    1997–2017
    #5,765
    in 2017
  • France
    1910–2023
    #3,979
    in 2023
  • Canada
    1991–2020
    #2,626
    in 2020
  • South Australia
    1944–1994
    #716
    in 1994

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

Notable people named Nita

People whose public names include Nita, backed by Wikidata given-name records and ordered by linked Wikimedia pages. The name may be a middle name.

People data from Wikidata (CC0). Fame is measured, not judged — the order reflects how widely each person is documented, not the U.S. birth records popularity this page is otherwise about.

Nita in other languages

Cross-language forms and variants of Nita. Linked forms have their own page here.

NetaAnitaEnitaInita

Variant forms from Wikidata (CC0). Most are used mainly outside the United States; U.S. birth records statistics cover US usage only.

Nita by the numbers

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

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
#12,823
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
Down 1,960
Best rank ever
#432
1895
Peak year
1956
403 that year
First recorded
1881
Last recorded
2025
All-time count
14,268
Count in 2025
7

Names similar to Nita

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

VitaLitaBenitaZitaNikitaLolitaNityaRositaLupitaAlitaBonitaMaritaSaritaLanitaJovitaRitaNithyaEvitaAngelitaGitaSitaDanitaRenitaAnita

Names with a curve like Nita

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

KittyPattieLornaMadonnaCarleneDonaIleneArleenRobbieTwilaDorethaGeorgette

Sibling names for Nita

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 Nita

Top names of 1956, Nita's peak yearThe 1950s in fullOther names that peaked in 1895Girls' names starting with N