Danuta
Around 290,000 Polish women carry it, but it's barely given now: just 46 newborn girls last year. Slavic at root, read as "god is my judge".
Danuta Pronunciation
Danuta is pronounced dah-NOO-tah (/daˈnuta/).
What Danuta means
Where Danuta comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Danuta grew from Slavic roots, one of a family of names built on the old element dan. Poles gave it familiar shapes early. Danka serves for every day, Danusia for a child or for someone loved.
Henryk Sienkiewicz put a Danusia at the centre of his 1900 novel Krzyżacy. Anna Danuta Jurandówna, daughter of Jurand of Spychów, is barely twelve when the story opens. That book carried the name into thousands of Polish homes, and much of its later popularity traces back to her.
You will also find Danuta glossed as "god is my judge", and in Polish as darowana przez boga. That reading came later, pulled toward the Hebrew Daniel rather than the Slavic root itself. The name keeps several days on the calendar. The busiest falls on 24 June.
How many people are named Danuta
1 in 77 women in Poland is named Danuta. 291,388 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #35 among female names.
Danuta's popularity over time
46 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #365 among newborns. It is making a comeback after a low in 2006. Still the #35 name among living women, even as it slips to #365 among newborns.
Where Danuta is most popular
Danuta is most popular in Warmian-Masurian, 74% above the national average (22 girls born 2019–2025), followed by Pomeranian (+39%) and Kuyavian-Pomeranian (+30%). It is least common in Subcarpathian and Opole, 76% and 51% below average respectively.
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Warmian-Masurian22 girls born+74%
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Pomeranian36 girls born+39%
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Kuyavian-Pomeranian25 girls born+30%
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Masovian81 girls born+30%
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Lesser Poland45 girls born+12%
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Lower Silesian28 girls born+1%
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Greater Poland38 girls born0%
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Silesian40 girls born0%
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Łódź20 girls born−10%
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Podlaskie9 girls born−22%
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West Pomeranian11 girls born−26%
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Lubusz6 girls born−31%
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Lublin11 girls born−39%
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Opole4 girls born−51%
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Subcarpathian5 girls born−76%
Danuta as a middle name
Danuta is a first name for 291,388 women in Poland and a middle name for another 129,132, a 69/31 split. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 20th, between Dorota (133,476) and Stanisława (120,903).
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18
135,087Marta
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19
133,476Dorota
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20129,132Danuta
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21
120,903Stanisława
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22
120,044Beata
When Danuta celebrates name day
Danuta appears 3 times in the Polish name day calendar. The main date is 16 February.