Anya
From Hebrew, where it carries the sense of "grace". It stays rare in Poland: most people here have never met an Anya, and the register logs only a couple of newborn girls in a typical year.
Anya Pronunciation
Anya is pronounced ah-NIH-ah (/aˈnɨa/).
What Anya means
Where Anya comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Anya begins in Hebrew, in the name Channah, which carried the sense of grace, of favor granted. Polish reached that root through Anna, and Anya settled beside it as one of the name's Russian faces. Readers of Tolstoy know the fuller form from Anna Karenina, while Chekhov gave the tender Anya to the young daughter in The Cherry Orchard.
Polish holds a whole family of softer forms. Ania is the everyday one, Anka is blunter, Andzia is smaller still. Older ears will recognize Hania and Hanna, which keep the breathed H that the Hebrew original once had.
The meaning stayed close to the beginning. Grace, in Polish łaska, is what the name has always offered. On an imieniny in late July, an Anya shares the day with every Anna and Hanna, all of them answering to the same old word for grace.
How many people are named Anya
1 in 135806 women in Poland is named Anya. 166 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #2495 among female names.
Anya's popularity over time
2 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #1454 among newborns. It has been climbing since 2021.
Anya as a middle name
Anya is a first name for 166 women in Poland and a middle name for another 25, an 87/13 split. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 1416th, between Angelique (25) and Chiamaka (25).
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#1414 Amara25
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#1415 Angelique25
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#1416 Anya25
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#1417 Chiamaka25
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#1418 Eduarda25