Riitta

given name · Latin script

Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise

/riːt̪ːɑ/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated

Riitta is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Finland than in any other country, where it is the 40th most common given name. Recorded meaning: Medieval vernacular form of Swedish Brita, from Birgitta (“Bridget”).

rarermore common
  • FIFinland1 in 153(measured from records)
  • SESweden1 in 6.5K
  • USUnited States1 in 2.5M

carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.

Finland (measured from records)

36,497 people

Sources
90 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

1 in 153 (inferred from the name graph)

Finland

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

Medieval vernacular form of Swedish Brita, from Birgitta (“Bridget”).

Sources 3

Attested across 21 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Riitta 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.

Where Riitta is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
FI Finland#4036,4971 in 15346KRiitta90
SE Sweden#8811,5641 in 6.5K1.6KRiitta40
US United States—1331 in 2.5M132Riitta81
DE Germany—≈97 est.≈1 in 830K1Riitta34
GB United Kingdom—≈55 est.≈1 in 1.2M—Riitta31
CH Switzerland—≈36 est.≈1 in 232K—Riitta9
NO Norway—≈26 est.≈1 in 212K64Riitta5
EE Estonia—≈16 est.≈1 in 78KlistedRiitta4

36,497 people counted by DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register). 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: DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); the de-leipzig-vornamen register; SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, living population); the ee-siseministeerium-registry register. 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 names spelled this way(inferred from the name graph)

Riitta is also recorded as 2 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • French given name3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Finland, France, United States, Canada

    Also written Riittà

  • Russian given name17 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Finland

    Languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Polish

    Also written Ритта, Рітта, Ritta, Риитта, Рийтта

38 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Notable people with this name(measured from records)

12001400160018002000Rita, b. 1381Mercedes of Orléans, b. 1860Rita Levi-Montalcini, b. 1909Rita Johnson, b. 1913Rita Pavone, b. 1945Rita Marley, b. 1946Mia Martini, b. 1947Rita Wilson, b. 1956Rita Ora, b. 1990
  • Ritab. 1381ITnot in their usual nameItalian Augustinian nun
  • Mercedes of Orléansb. 1860ESnot in their usual nameQueen consort of Spain
  • Rita Levi-Montalcinib. 1909ITnot in their usual nameItalian neurologist (1909–2012)
  • Rita Johnsonb. 1913USnot in their usual nameactress (1913-1965)
  • Rita Pavoneb. 1945ITnot in their usual nameItalian actress and singer (1945-)
  • Rita Marleyb. 1946CUnot in their usual nameJamaican musician
  • Mia Martinib. 1947ITnot in their usual nameItalian singer (1947–1995)
  • Rita Wilsonb. 1956USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress, singer and producer
  • Rita Orab. 1990GBnot in their usual nameEnglish-Albanian singer and actress
  • Rita PatelINnot in their usual namecricketer

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)

InformalHei Riitta,Hi Riitta, (English)

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 15 sources across 10 countries.

Official registers attesting Riitta
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
FI FinlandDVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup)—46K#31
FI FinlandDVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register)—36K—
SE SwedenSkatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population)—1.6K#1,251
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)19991.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20001.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20011.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20021.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20031.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20041.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20051.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20061.2K—
SE SwedenSCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023)20071.2K—

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 Riitta mean, and where does it come from?
Medieval vernacular form of Swedish Brita, from Birgitta (“Bridget”). Recorded by Wiktionary and Förnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon and 1 other source.
In which country does Riitta have the most bearers?
In Finland, the national register counted about 36 thousand people named Riitta, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled riitta.
Where is Riitta most common?
Riitta is densest in Finland, where the national register counts about 1 in 153 people carrying it.
How do you pronounce Riitta?
A machine transcription gives /riːt̪ːɑ/ (IPA) for Finnish.
Is Riitta a male or female name?
Riitta 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 Riitta?
In the etymology graph, Brigitte, Bridget and Birgit are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Piritta.
How common is the name Riitta?
In Finland, the national register counted 36,497 people named Riitta, about 1 in 153 residents.
How common is Riitta compared with other names?
In Finland, Riitta is the 40th most common given name of 19,056 given names recorded there.

What do you want to know about Riitta?

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Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/riitta

The 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, “Riitta” — the 40th most common given name in Finland. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Riitta parses inside a full name →