Barbara is a female first name. In very rare cases it is also used for boys.
The name Barbara isn’t among the current fashionable names in our top 10 stats, but nonetheless, it’s still very popular and common. In our SmartGenius ranking of all girls names, Barbara ranks 814. Recently, out of every 10,000 newborn girls, approximately 2 were named Barbara. In total, there are currently 1,426,627 people – children, adults and seniors – named Barbara living in the United States, which is approximately 0.43 % of the entire population.
Derived from the Greek word ‘barbaros’, the name Barbara means ‘foreign’ or ‘strange’. Early Christians sometimes referred to themselves as ‘barbarians’ in opposition to the pagan Romans and Greeks. Therefore, this name was very popular among Catholics in the Middle Ages.
From 1932 to 1945,... Barbara was ranked in the top 3 most popular first names in the United States.
History tends to focus on the most famous and best. But even those who play second fiddle leave their mark: Barbara is one of those names without which the orchestra would be incomplete. In fact, Barbara has reached the SmartGenius top ranking #2 more than once, although the last time was some while ago, way back in the last century in 1944. But even though the peak of its popularity was many decades ago, the name Barbara has been given to newborn girls every year since records began. Barbara is of exceptional enduring popularity, conveying the special vibes of the20th century.
In years where the graph has no value, the name Barbara was given less than five times or even none at all in the entire USA.
The popularity of the name Barbara peaked long ago, but the name has nevertheless arrived in the 21st century. In 2021, it ranked #823 in our statistics - perhaps a far cry from when your grandparents or great-grandparents were kids and Barbara made it into the top ten more than once, but still: Traditional names often prove to be perennial favorites - so, maybe it's only a matter of time before Barbara tops out again.
Regardless of where you live in the US, chances are you know someone called Barbara. Because: There are women and girls named Barbara in every state in the USA. If this does not sound particularly spectacular to you, you should know that of the more than 50,000 different female first names that occur in the USA, just 537 are recorded in each individual state, so the name Barbara is definitely something very special. In some regions it even makes it into the top 10 of the most popular female first names, for example in Rhode Island, where Barbara ranks on place 2, making it one of the most common female first names in the entire state. The greatest chance of meeting Barbara, however, is in Washington, D.C., where one in 58 girls and women bears this beautiful name – that is far above average – in the entire USA it is only one in 108, women and girls and in Nevada, where the name is least represented in relation to the population, you even have to ask an average of 302 women and girls for their name before you once get Barbara as an answer.
Well, you might say, you probably figured that out yourself! But what you might not know is: 3.2% of all common girls' names in the US begin with a B. This means that B as the first letter for girls' names is neither particularly common nor rare. The most common first letters of girls' names are A, S and M, while U, X and Q are the least common initials of girls' names.
With seven letters, the name Barbara has a typical length for first names in the US. In fact, 26% of all common first names consist of exactly seven letters. 52% of all first names are shorter, while 22% have eight letters or more. On average, first names in the US (not counting hyphenated names) are 6.5 letters long. There are no significant differences between boys' and girls' names.
Thus, if 3.2% of all girls’ names start with a B, this initial letter is slightly less common than all other letters on average. Nevertheless, there are girls' names with B that are quite common in the U.S., the most common at present is Barbara.
If your name is Barbara and someone asks after your name, you can of course just tell them what it is. But sometimes that isn't so easy - what if it's too loud, and you don't understand them well? Or what if the other person is so far away that you can see them but not hear them? In these situations, you can communicate your name in so many other ways: you call spell it, sign it, or even use a flag to wave it...
So that everyone really understands you when you have to spell the name Barbara, you can simply say:
Butterfly
Apple
Rocket
Butterfly
Apple
Rocket
Apple
Braille is made up of dots, which the blind and visually impaired can feel to read words.
Barbara
Barbara
Just use American Sign Language!
These flags are used for maritime communication - each flag represents a letter.
B
A
R
B
A
R
A
In the navy, sailors of two ships might wave flags to each other to send messages. A sailor holds two flags in specific positions to represent different letters.
B
A
R
B
A
R
A
In Morse code, letters and other characters are represented only by a series of short and long tones. For example, a short tone followed by a long tone stands for the letter A. Barbara sounds like this:
