Laura
From the Latin for "laurel". The name rings familiar across Poland: given steadily for years, though it has been easing off since a peak early this decade.
Laura Pronunciation
Laura is pronounced lah-OO-rah (/laˈura/).
What Laura means
Where Laura comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Laura grows from the Latin laurus, the laurel tree. In Poland the same root stands behind wawrzyn, the laurel wreath once set on the heads of victors and poets. So the name means, quite literally, laurel.
The word gathered its glory slowly. Romans crowned generals and champions with laurel branches, and the leaf became a sign of honor before it ever became a name. When Petrarch built his Canzoniere around a woman he called Laura, he leaned on that double sense, the woman and the laurel at once.
Polish keeps a few relatives close. Laurencja is the fuller variant, and the laurel root also feeds Wawrzyniec, the Polish form of Laurentius. Read a class register and a Laura will not surprise you.
The name stays short and plain. Two syllables and one old meaning: laurel, the wawrzyn of Polish.
When Laura celebrates name day
Laura appears 4 times in the Polish name day calendar, 1 of them as a main name, the first on 17 June.
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 Laura
1 in 288 women in Poland is named Laura. 78,223 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #144 among female names.
Laura's popularity over time
3,821 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #11 among newborns. It has been climbing since 2002.
Where Laura is most popular
Laura is given fairly evenly across Poland, with no strong regional preference. It leans slightly toward Podlaskie (15% above the national average) and is least common in Lower Silesian (17% below).
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Podlaskie1,122 girls born+15%
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Łódź2,078 girls born+11%
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Lublin1,650 girls born+9%
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Subcarpathian1,943 girls born+9%
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Świętokrzyskie891 girls born+9%
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Kuyavian-Pomeranian1,748 girls born+8%
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Lesser Poland3,402 girls born+1%
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Masovian5,229 girls born0%
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Pomeranian2,162 girls born−1%
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Warmian-Masurian1,038 girls born−2%
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Silesian3,279 girls born−3%
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Lubusz700 girls born−5%
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West Pomeranian1,189 girls born−5%
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Opole644 girls born−6%
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Greater Poland2,986 girls born−6%
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Lower Silesian1,937 girls born−17%
Laura as a middle name
Laura is a first name for 78,223 women in Poland and a middle name for another 18,174, an 81/19 split. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 90th, between Rozalia (19,234) and Amelia (17,755).
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#88 Martyna20,318
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#89 Rozalia19,234
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#90 Laura18,174
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#91 Amelia17,755
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#92 Bernadeta16,482