Pernilla
given name · Latin script
Meaning: a female given name derived from Petronella
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/pʰɛrn̪ɪl̪a/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Pernilla is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Sweden than in any other country.
- SESweden1 in 552(measured from records)
- FIFinland1 in 11K
- DKDenmark1 in 325as Pernille
carrying the name, as counted by each country's national register. Where a country counts another spelling of the name rather than Pernilla 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.
- Sweden (measured from records)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 12 (measured from records)
- 1 in 552 (inferred from the name graph)
18,488 people
recorded for this name
Reference-verified
Sweden
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
One other spelling is counted as the same name:
Locally spelled Pernille in NO Norway.
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)
a female given name derived from Petronella
Sources 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested across 19 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Pernilla 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.
18,488 people counted by Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population). 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: Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts); SSB PxWebApi — Persons/Last names by year (StatBank tables 10501/12891); SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, living population); DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); Meertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018); Þjóðskrá Íslands — Name frequencies (NafnTíðni, registry). 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)
Pernilla is also recorded in 3 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In Swedish, Pernilla och Pernille är nordiska former av → Petronella. En känd namnbärare är skådespelerskan Pernilla Wahlgren (f. 1967). I den rikssvenska almanackan 31 maj och i den finlandssvenska 29 juni.
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
[Ignoto]
as a nameIl grande libro dei nomi per bebè. Significato, origini, curiosità. Oltre 7000 nomi per bambine e bambini Significato,…
Swedish form of Latin Petronilla (see PETRONEL ). Cognate: Pernille (Danish) .
as a word
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)
- Pernilla Augustb. 1958SESwedish actress and film director
- Pernilla Stalfeltb. 1962SESwedish writer
- Pernilla Oljelundb. 1962SESwedish journalist, screenwriter and children's writer (born 1962)
- Pernilla Wahlgrenb. 1967SESwedish singer, actress and presenter
- Mejab. 1969SEnot in their usual nameSwedish singer
- Pernilla Wibergb. 1970SESwedish female alpine skier and businesswoman
- Pernilla Allwinb. 1970SESwedish actress
- Pernilla Anderssonb. 1974SESwedish singer-songwriter
- Pernilla Lindbergb. 1986SESwedish female golfer
- Pernilla Karlssonb. 1990FIFinnish singer and handball 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 29 sources across 17 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 18K | #236 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2008 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2009 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2010 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2011 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2013 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2012 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2014 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2016 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2015 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2017 | 13K | — |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2018 | 13K | — |
Reference works 2
- 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 Pernilla mean, and where does it come from?
- a female given name derived from Petronella Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- What are other forms of the name Pernilla?
- In the etymology graph, Nela, Pernille and Petronela are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Petronella.
- How do you pronounce Pernilla?
- A machine transcription gives /pʰɛrn̪ɪl̪a/ (IPA) for Swedish.
- Is Pernilla a male or female name?
- Pernilla 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 Pernilla have the most bearers?
- In Sweden, the national register counted about 18 thousand people named Pernilla, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled pernilla.
- Where is Pernilla most common?
- Pernilla is densest in Sweden, where the national register counts about 1 in 552 people carrying it.
- How common is the name Pernilla?
- In Sweden, the national register counted 18,488 people named Pernilla, about 1 in 552 residents.
What do you want to know about Pernilla?
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/pernillaThe 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, “Pernilla”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.