Gretel
given name · Latin script
Meaning, in English: A diminutive of the female given name Margarete, from German
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/ɣɾetel/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Gretel is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country.
- USUnited States1 in 175K(measured from records)
- CRCosta Rica1 in 14K
- UYUruguay1 in 17K
carrying the name, as counted by each country's national register. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- United States (measured from records)
- Sources
- 191 (measured from records)
- 1 in 14K (inferred from the name graph)
1,906 people, 2020
Highest-authority source
Costa Rica
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
A diminutive of the female given name Margarete, from German.
Sources 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested across 13 languages in the etymology graph.
How Gretel is read(measured from records)
Gretel is one spelling over 3 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- Spanish46%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Gretel in Spanish.
- English27%
A diminutive of the female given name Margarete, from German.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
diminutive of Greta
as a nameBaby names, 25,350 baby names nicknames for your family, friends pets, including the top 100 names, 2,000 most popular…
- German13%
a diminutive of the female given name Margarete
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Often considered alongside
Names that people choosing a name often weigh against Gretel, most often first. They share a style rather than an origin.
From the names suggested together in public name-advice forums, in English. A list of what people consider, not a measure of how common any name is.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Gretel 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | 1,906 | 1 in 175K | 1.9K | Gretel | 191 |
| CR Costa Rica | 362 | 1 in 14K | 362 | — | — |
| FI Finland | 280 | 1 in 20K | 990 | Gretel | 4 |
| ES Spain | 230 | 1 in 217K | 230 | Gretel | 21 |
| SE Sweden | 210 | 1 in 49K | 210 | Gretel | 9 |
| UY Uruguay | 202 | 1 in 17K | 202 | — | — |
| GY Guyana | 7 | 1 in 107K | 7 | — | 1 |
1,906 people counted by Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex, 2020. 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; DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); TSE — electoral roll (padrón) names; INE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos); Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); INE Uruguay — Nombres más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public); Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025. 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)
Gretel is also recorded in 2 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In Swedish, Gretel är ursprungligen en tysk smekform till → Margareta. I den finlandssvenska alma nackan 20 juli.
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
In French, Diminutif allemand de Margarete, du grec *margaritēs*, « perle ».
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)
- Gretel Adornob. 1902DEGerman chemist (1902-1993)
- Gretel Bergmannb. 1914USGerman high jumper
- Gretel Escherb. 1915DEGerman illustrator, journalist and writer (1915-2015)
- Gretel Beerb. 1921ATAustrian-British author
- Gretel Eischb. 1937DEGerman sculptor (1937–2022)
- Gretel Ehrlichb. 1946USAmerican writer
- Gretel Schulzeb. 1948DEGerman Kabarett artist
- Gretel Killeenb. 1963AUAustralian television host, author and comedian
- Gretel Scarlettb. 1987AUAustralian musical theatre performer
- Gretel Tippettb. 1993AUAustralian netball player
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).
How to address them(machine-generated)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 53 sources across 31 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 1.9K | #7,815 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 990 | #802 |
| CR Costa Rica | TSE — electoral roll (padrón) names | — | 362 | #1,030 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register) | — | 280 | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 1999 | 260 | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2000 | 254 | — |
| ES Spain | INE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos) | — | 230 | #8,095 |
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 210 | #5,059 |
| UY Uruguay | INE Uruguay — Nombres más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public) | — | 202 | — |
| UY Uruguay | INE Uruguay — Nombres más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public) | — | 198 | — |
| ES Spain | INE — Nombres más frecuentes (Padrón Municipal) | — | 187 | #4,303 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2020 | 146 | — |
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 Gretel mean, and where does it come from?
- A diminutive of the female given name Margarete, from German. Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- What are other forms of the name Gretel?
- In the etymology graph, Margaret, Rita and Margarita are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Grete.
- How do you pronounce Gretel?
- A machine transcription gives /ɣɾetel/ (IPA) for Spanish.
- Is Gretel a male or female name?
- Gretel 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.
- In which country does Gretel have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 1.9 thousand people named Gretel, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled gretel.
- Where is Gretel most common?
- Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Gretel is densest in Costa Rica — about 1 in 14 thousand people — even though United States holds more of our records for it.
- How common is the name Gretel?
- In the United States, the national register counted 1,906 people named Gretel in 2020, about 1 in 175 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Gretel?
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/gretelThe 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, “Gretel”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.