Emma

Did you know?

A few things about Emma you might not know, from US birth records and Wikipedia. Handy for convincing a partner, or a grandparent.

⭐ Famous Emma

Emma Thompson

English actress and screenwriter (born 1959)

Choose Emma and your child shares a first name with Emma Thompson, an English actress and screenwriter. A ready-made answer when someone asks “Emma, like who?” Emma Thompson's Wikipedia article is available in 88 languages, a good sign of just how widely known they are.

Read about Emma Thompson on Wikipedia ↗ (opens in a new tab)

Photo: Kalai Ramu, CC BY-SA 4.0 (opens in a new tab), via Wikimedia Commons

• 👶How commonAbout 1 in every 126 baby girls born in the US in 2025 was named Emma, 12,754 babies in all. In a school of 500 kids, you'd expect to meet about 2 Emmas.
• 📜HistoryEmma has been in use since at least 1880, the first year US birth records were kept. That's 145 years of Emmas, and counting.
• 🏆Best yearIts best year was 2018, when it reached #1.
• 📍Where it's lovedEmma is the #1 girl name in 5 states, including Washington, D.C., New Jersey and New York. It makes the top 1,000 in almost every state.
• 💬MeaningIn Germanic, Emma means “whole, universal”.
• 🌍OriginEmma is the #2 most popular German girl name in the US. That's out of 745 German girl and unisex names in our list.

About the name Emma

Emma is a girl name of German origin meaning “whole, universal”. It has 4 letters and 2 syllables, starting with E and ending in “-mma”. US birth records list Emma for girls from 1880 to 2025, in 146 of those 146 years. Its best year was 2018, when it ranked #1 among girl names. In 2025 it ranked #3, with 12,754 babies.

Origin:German names