Rita
From Latin, tied to the word for "pearl". Once uncommon, it's climbing back: a name you'd notice on a playground, now given to more girls each year than it was a decade ago.
Rita Pronunciation
Rita is pronounced REE-tah (/ˈrita/).
What Rita means
Where Rita comes from and what it has meant to the people who carry it.
Rita comes from Latin, a short form of Margarita, and the Latin word behind it means pearl. Margarita traveled into many languages, and Rita is what remains when the longer name is worn down to two syllables. In Polish the meaning is perła, the pearl pulled from an oyster.
The name found its most famous bearer in Saint Rita of Cascia, an Italian widow who lived across the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries and is still invoked in hard cases. Her feast falls on 22 May, which is why Rita keeps her imieniny then.
Rita also has a Polish variant, Ryta, spelled with a y where the first form uses an i. On a school register both can sit on the same page, one child after another. Both trace back to perła.
When Rita celebrates name day
Rita appears 1 time in the Polish name day calendar, never as a main name. The first of these dates is 29 April.
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 Rita
1 in 3494 women in Poland is named Rita. 6,453 people carry it in the 2025 register: rank #438 among female names.
Rita's popularity over time
246 girls were given the name in 2025, ranking #162 among newborns. It has been climbing since 2000.
Where Rita is most popular
Rita is most popular in Lesser Poland, 171% above the national average (531 girls born 2019–2025), followed by Subcarpathian (+121%) and Pomeranian (+25%). It is least common in Warmian-Masurian and Świętokrzyskie, 63% and 54% below average respectively.
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Lesser Poland531 girls born+171%
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Subcarpathian230 girls born+121%
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Pomeranian159 girls born+25%
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Masovian236 girls born−23%
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Greater Poland141 girls born−24%
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Silesian143 girls born−27%
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Lubusz30 girls born−30%
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Lublin61 girls born−31%
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Lower Silesian83 girls born−39%
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Łódź64 girls born−41%
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Kuyavian-Pomeranian53 girls born−44%
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West Pomeranian40 girls born−45%
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Opole21 girls born−47%
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Podlaskie28 girls born−51%
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Świętokrzyskie22 girls born−54%
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Warmian-Masurian23 girls born−63%
Rita as a middle name
Rita is a first name for 6,453 women in Poland and a middle name for another 7,804, a 45/55 split, almost evenly. In the women's middle-name ranking it sits 122nd, between Marcelina (7,844) and Adrianna (7,536).
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#120 Daniela8,071
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#121 Marcelina7,844
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#122 Rita7,804
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#123 Adrianna7,536
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#124 Roksana7,416