Lidya
A feminine name of Greek origin meaning "woman from Lydia".
Name Census estimates that about 393 living Americans carry the first name Lidya. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Lidya today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Lidya births was 2024 (23 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Lidya. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Lidya with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
393
~ 1 in 872,148 Americans
Peak year
2024
23 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2024 SSA rank
#5,519
Tracked since 1981
Census
Lidya in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,074 people with the first name Lidya, which placed it at #11,785 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#11,785
National first-name rank
People counted
1.1K
1,074 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
37.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Lidya
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Lidya is Hispanic at 37.1%. The next largest groups are Black (34.8%) and White (21.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Lidya described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Lidya at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino37.1% · 398
- Black or African American34.8% · 374
- White21.4% · 230
- Asian and Pacific Islander5.6% · 60
- Two or more races1.1% · 12
Popularity
Lidya: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Lidya from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 121 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Lidya remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Lidya by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Lidya during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Lidyas live
Origin
Meaning and history of Lidya
The name Lidya is derived from the ancient Greek name Λυδία (Lydia), which referred to the region of Lydia in western Anatolia (modern-day Turkey). The word "Lydia" itself was derived from the name of the mythological hero Lydus, who was said to be the founder of the ancient Lydian kingdom.
This name has its roots in the Lydian language, which was spoken in the region until the 1st century BC. The Lydians were known for their advanced civilization and were credited with inventing the first coins used for currency.
In ancient Greek mythology, Lydia was also the name of a woman who was said to have been turned into a slender tree by the gods for rejecting the love of the river god Xanthus. This story is referenced in Ovid's "Metamorphoses," an epic work of ancient Roman literature.
The earliest known historical figure with the name Lidya was Lidya Makedonskaya (c. 360 BC - c. 335 BC), a Macedonian princess who was the daughter of King Philip II of Macedon and Audата, an Illyrian princess.
Another notable figure with this name was Lidya Petrova (1756 - 1826), a Russian painter and engraver who was one of the first women to be accepted into the Imperial Academy of Arts in St. Petersburg.
In the 19th century, Lidya Zamenhof (1904 - 1965) was a Polish-Russian writer and translator who helped to promote the international auxiliary language Esperanto, which was created by her father, L.L. Zamenhof.
Lidya Temirina (1879 - 1962) was a Russian soprano who had a successful career performing in operas and concerts throughout Europe and Russia in the early 20th century.
Lidya Kovalenko (1909 - 1977) was a Soviet sniper during World War II who was credited with over 300 confirmed kills, making her one of the deadliest snipers in military history.
People
Lidya + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Lidya as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with L
Other first names starting with L with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Lidya: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Lidya?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 393 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Lidya going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 872,148 US residents.
Is Lidya a common name?
We classify Lidya as "Very Rare". It ranks above 82.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 400 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Lidya most popular?
The single biggest year for Lidya was 2024, when 23 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Lidya is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Lidya in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,074 people with the name Lidya, or 0.36 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #11,785 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Lidya in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Lidya?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Lidya appears almost entirely female. Of the 1,068 people counted with this name, 99.6% were female and only a very small share were male. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Lidya?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Lidya is Hispanic at 37.1%. The next largest groups are Black (34.8%) and White (21.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Lidya most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Lidya in the 2020 Census, accounting for 37.1% (398 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Lidya in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Lidya a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Lidya in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Lidya still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Lidya in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Lidya can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How common is the name Lidya?
Our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers how many Americans are named Lidya at a glance, with the living-bearer count up front.