Oliwia
From the Greek for "olive tree". It sits just inside Poland's top 100 girls' names and stays common enough that you almost certainly know one, though fewer girls get it each year now than at its 2000s peak.
Oliwia Pronunciation
Oliwia is pronounced o-LEEV-yah (/ɔˈlivja/).
What Oliwia means
Where Oliwia comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Oliwia comes from Greek roots tied to the olive tree, and that plain meaning, "olive tree," sits under everything the name later gathered. The Latin form Oliva and its cousins spread the olive across Europe, and Polish took it as Oliwia, with the masculine Oliwier standing beside it as its cross-gender pair.
The olive itself has long stood for peace and for a kind of durability, since the tree bears fruit for centuries and survives poor soil. That association came to the name over time rather than from any single moment. A Polish child named Oliwia inherits a word far older than the Polish spelling that now carries it.
Read a class register in a Polish school today and you will likely find an Oliwia near the top. The name climbed the popularity lists after 1990 and held there for years. Girls answer to it in every voivodeship.
What stays constant is the small green fact underneath: the olive tree.
When Oliwia celebrates name day
Oliwia appears 2 times in the Polish name day calendar, 1 of them as a main name, the first on 5 March.
The days Polish calendars list this name on. By custom you celebrate one of them, usually the first after your birthday.
Rarer dates. Only the most complete calendars add this name on these days. Most skip them, so hardly anyone celebrates then.
How many people are named Oliwia
1 in 138 women in Poland is named Oliwia. 163,335 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #89 among female names.
Oliwia's popularity over time
3,067 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #17 among newborns. It has been stable for a decade.
Where parents choose Oliwia
Oliwia is given fairly evenly across Poland, with no strong regional preference. It leans slightly toward Podlaskie (16% above the national average) and is least common in Opole (10% below).
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Podlaskie
+16%1 in 64 babies
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Holy Cross
+14%1 in 65 babies
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Łódź
+9%1 in 68 babies
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Opole
−10%1 in 81 babies
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Pomeranian
−8%1 in 80 babies
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West Pomeranian
−8%1 in 80 babies
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Podlaskie+16% 1,033 born1 in 64 babies+16%
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Holy Cross+14% 857 born1 in 65 babies+14%
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Łódź+9% 1,871 born1 in 68 babies+9%
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Subcarpathian+7% 1,758 born1 in 69 babies+7%
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Lublin+5% 1,468 born1 in 70 babies+5%
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Lesser Poland+4% 3,211 born1 in 71 babies+4%
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Silesian+2% 3,144 born1 in 72 babies+2%
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Lower Silesian+1% 2,155 born1 in 73 babies+1%
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Warmian-Masurian−2% 956 born1 in 75 babies−2%
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Masovian−3% 4,658 born1 in 76 babies−3%
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Kuyavian-Pomeranian−4% 1,420 born1 in 77 babies−4%
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Lubusz−5% 641 born1 in 77 babies−5%
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Greater Poland−7% 2,731 born1 in 79 babies−7%
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Pomeranian−8% 1,852 born1 in 80 babies−8%
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West Pomeranian−8% 1,053 born1 in 80 babies−8%
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Opole−10% 567 born1 in 81 babies−10%
Oliwia as a middle name
Oliwia is a first name for 163,335 women in Poland and a middle name for another 29,977, an 84/16 split. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 70th, between Kamila (31,160) and Genowefa (27,302).
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#68 Bogumiła31,326
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#69 Kamila31,160
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#70 Oliwia29,977
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#71 Genowefa27,302
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#72 Mirosława26,134