Minna
given name · Latin script
Meaning: German: short form of Wilhelmina, 'warrior, guardian'
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Minna is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in South Korea than in any other country. In Finland it is the 31st most common given name.
- FIFinland1 in 190(measured from records)
- SESweden1 in 2.2K
- RORomania≈1 in 1.7Kas Minah
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). Where a country counts another spelling of the name rather than Minna itself, the figure is that spelling’s, and it is named. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- South Korea (inferred from the name graph)
- #791 (measured from records)
- 7 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 417 (measured from records)
- 1 in 190 (inferred from the name graph)
≈31,000 named 민아, est.
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Finland
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Locally spelled Mina in US United States, NO Norway, ID Indonesia, 민아 in KR South Korea and מינה in RO Romania.
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
German: short form of Wilhelmina, 'warrior, guardian'
Sources 1
- African Names
Attested across 12 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Minna counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KR South Korea | #155 | ≈31,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.7K | 343 | 민아 | 104 |
| FI Finland | #31 | 29,376 | 1 in 190 | 31K | Minna | 133 |
| US United States | — | 19,867as Mina | 1 in 17K | 17K | Mina | 417 |
| ID Indonesia | — | ≈14,000 est. | ≈1 in 19K | listed | Mina | 103 |
| RO Romania | #192 | ≈13,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.7K | — | מינה | 16 |
| NO Norway | #661 | 4,802as Mina | 1 in 1.1K | 16K | Mina | 62 |
| SE Sweden | #428 | 4,686 | 1 in 2.2K | 4.7K | Minna | 51 |
Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Supreme Court — newborn given names; DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); SSB PxWebApi — Persons/Last names by year (StatBank tables 10501/12891); SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, living population); Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Minna is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In German, from German Minne 'love, affection' or a female name
as a nameDeutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung
In French, Diminutive of Wilhelmina or Maria; origin uncertain
as a nameLe grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
In Swedish, Minna är ursprungligen en smekform till → Vilhelmina. Namnet har varit mycket populärt de senaste årtiondena men är nu på nedgång. I den finlandssvenska almanackan 26 maj.
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
Gruma (West Africa): 'mother'
as a nameAfrican Names
In French, Diminutif de Wilhelmina, forme germanique de Guillemette; origine germanique.
as a nameLe grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Minna Herzliebb. 1789DEGerman female publisher (1789-1865)
- Minna Planerb. 1809DEGerman actress and the first wife of composer Richard Wagner (1809–1866)
- Minna Kautskyb. 1837ATstage actor and writer (1837-1912)
- Minna Canthb. 1844FIFinnish writer, editor
- Minna Spechtb. 1879DEGerman educator and founding member of the Internationaler Sozialistischer Kampfbund (1879–1961)
- Minna Gombellb. 1892USAmerican actress (1892–1973)
- Minna Ledermanb. 1896USAmerican journalist (1896–1995)
- Minna Lachsb. 1907ATAustrian author (1907-1993)
- Claire Wikholmb. 1944SEnot in their usual nameSwedish actress
- Katariina Sourib. 1968FInot in their usual nameFinnish playmate and writer
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 61 sources across 32 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 31K | #62 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register) | — | 29K | — |
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 4.7K | #635 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2020 | 3.4K | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 1.7K | #8,316 |
| NO Norway | SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, living population) | — | 372 | #3,065 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 29 | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 5 | #8,316 |
Reference works 3
- Nişanyan Adlar (Turkish given-name national-registry frequency)
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Minna mean, and where does it come from?
- German: short form of Wilhelmina, 'warrior, guardian' Recorded by African Names.
- In which country does Minna have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 31 thousand people named 민아 in South Korea, more than in any other country we hold.
- Where is Minna most common?
- Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Minna is densest in Finland — about 1 in 190 people — even though South Korea holds more of our records for it.
- Is Minna a male or female name?
- Minna is a female name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- What are other forms of the name Minna?
- In the etymology graph, Mina, Vilma and Wilma are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Vilhelmina.
- How common is the name Minna?
- In Finland, the national register counted 29,376 people named Minna, about 1 in 190 residents.
- How common is Minna compared with other names?
- In South Korea, Minna is the 155th most common given name of 67,037 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Minna?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/minnaThe payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Minna” — the 155th most common given name in South Korea. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.