Alicia
Meaning
Spanish variant of Alice, "noble"
The story
Alicia is Alice passed through Latin, the same Germanic root meaning noble kind, and for a generation of American parents it was the modern way to say a very old name. The climb was long: about 22,500 in the 1960s, 39,400 in the 1970s, cresting at 67,200 in the 1980s, the decade that produced Alicia Keys, born 1981 at the height of it. The 1990s held 43,600, Clueless made Alicia Silverstone the face of 1995, and the slide since has been the ordinary retirement of a generation name, about 4,400 this decade. All told it counts about 230,700 girls. Alice, the source, stands at 572,900 and is fashionable again; Alyssa, the other modern descendant, adds 315,000 more. Alicia sits between them, the sound of noble wearing a Spanish lilt Alice never had.
Alicia around the world
One shared root links 21 names across 3 languages.
Shared root: a Germanic family built on adal "noble": Adalheidis "of noble kind" wore down through Old French Aalis into Alice and a crowd of descendants
The constellation
15 more branches of this family
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Alicia peaked in the 1980s and the 2000s in nearly equal measure.
Popularity in Brazil
84,293 people · the #363 first name in Brazil · about 1 in 2,410 · median age 7
Among people named Alicia living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 2010s than in any other decade.
The census also counted 24,822 born between 2020 and August 2022, too recent a span to chart.
Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
When you meet Alicia
Most people given the name Alicia in the United States were born between 1970 and 1999. The Alicia you meet today is most often in her 30s or 40s.
Estimated from US Social Security birth registrations and typical lifespans; a rough guide, not a rule.
The Alicia deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Alicia truly comes from, how it traveled, and what a century of records reveals. If you have grown a tree on nametree, it also considers how Alicia fits with your family’s names and surname.
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