Adina
Meaning of Adina
Adina stems from the Hebrew עֲדִינָא, traditionally glossed as “delicate” or “gentle,” and first surfaces in the Book of Chronicles as the name of a minor warrior—proof that semantics and job descriptions do not always align. In contemporary Anglo-American use it has been reassigned almost exclusively to girls; U.S. Social Security data show an annual band of roughly 90-160 newborns since 1960, which keeps the name in what statisticians label the “long-tail” zone (ranked 787 in 2024). Phonetically, Hebrew speakers favor ah-DEE-nah, while English reduces the initial vowel to uh-DEE-nuh, a shift typical of loanwords adapting to the schwa-friendly English stress pattern. The name’s unobtrusive popularity lends it an air of quiet distinctiveness—unlikely to trigger duplicate-name chaos at preschool roll call, yet familiar enough to spare its bearer a lifetime of spelling tutorials.
Pronunciation
Hebrew
- Pronunced as ah-DEE-nah (/aˈdiːna/)
English
- Pronunced as uh-DEE-nuh (/əˈdiːnə/)
U.S. Popularity Chart
States Popularity Chart
Notable People Named Adina
| Adina Howard is an American singer and songwriter who shot to fame in the mid-1990s with her hit debut single Freak Like Me. |
| Adina Mandlová was a scandal-prone Czech actress who ranked among the brightest film stars of the 1930s and 1940s. |
| Adina Thembi Ndamse is an award-winning Ghanaian and South African singer whose hit Too Late and album Araba earned her top honors at the Vodafone Ghana Music Awards. |
| Adina Bar-Shalom is an Israeli educator and activist who founded Jerusalem's first college for Haredi students and won the 2014 Israel Prize for her work against gender discrimination in the Orthodox community. |
| Adina Fohlin is a Swedish model and photographer who was discovered on a Stockholm street for her striking, unconventional looks. |
