In 2022, the Philippines welcomed 1,455,393 babies.
What were the most popular names among these babies? Althea and Nathaniel, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority.
Here are the country’s top 10 girl names and top 10 boy names of 2022:
Girl names
- Althea, 1,935 baby girls
- Angel, 1,388
- Samantha, 1,314
- Princess, 1,110
- Nathalie, 1,094
- Chloe, 1,056
- Sofia, 1,046
- Zia, 984
- Athena, 983
- Sophia, 973
Boy names
- Nathaniel, 1,956 baby boys
- Jacob, 1,781
- Ezekiel, 1,662
- Gabriel, 1,583
- Nathan, 1,557
- Ethan, 1,359
- Noah, 1,322
- Liam, 1,198
- James, 1,151
- Matthew, 1,138
In the girls’ top 10, Zia and Athena replaced Andrea and Angela.
In the boys’ top 10, Noah and Liam replaced Angelo and Zion.
And which baby names saw the biggest jumps in usage?
- Noah, which rose from 931 to 1,322 baby boys [2021 to 2022]
- Avianna Louise, which rose from 11 to 295 baby girls [2021 to 2022]
Avianna Louise’s extreme increase must be attributable to something, though I’m not sure what.
In lieu of that, here’s some fun data from a 2017 infographic (PDF) showing how beauty queens have influenced girl names in the Philippines over the years.
In 1974 and 1994 — the first two times that the Philippines hosted the Miss Universe pageant — babies were named after both the delegate from the Philippines and the delegate who won the pageant:
| Name | Delegate | Usage Increase (baby girls) |
| Guadalupe | Guadalupe Sanchez Miss Philippines 1974 | 46 to 87 [1973 to 1974] |
| Amparo | Amparo Muñoz (of Spain) Miss Universe 1974 | 127 to 689 [1973 to 1974] |
| Charlene | Charlene Gonzales Miss Philippines 1994 | 1,345 to 4,178 [1993 to 1994] |
| Sushmita | Sushmita Sen (of India) Miss Universe 1994 | 3 to 535 [1993 to 1994] |
And in 1969, 1973, and 2015, the delegate from the Philippines was the winner of the pageant:
| Name | Delegate | Usage increase (baby girls) |
| Gloria | Gloria Diaz Miss Universe 1969 | 3,100 to 3,413 [1968 to 1969] |
| Margarita or Margie (not specified) | Margarita “Margie” Moran Miss Universe 1973 | 1,706 to 2,351 [1972 to 1973] |
| Pia | Pia Wurtzbach Miss Universe 2015 | 621 to 925 [2015 to 2016] |
A fourth Filipina, Catriona Gray, won Miss Universe (and likewise influenced baby names) in 2018.
Sources: Most Common Baby Names of 2022 – Philippine Statistics Authority (PDF), Registered Live Births in the Philippines, 2022 – Philippine Statistics Authority
Image: Adapted from Flag of the Philippines (public domain)
Hi, I’m from the Philippines. When I saw Avianna Louise, I did a quick search and learned about Avianna Celeste Abrenica, the daughter of local actors Vin Abrenica and Sophie Albert. The kid was born in March 2021. Her parents posted on YouTube about it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nCju2JJBfbw
There is also “The University Series,” a set of popular Wattpad stories. They’re written in a mix of Tagalog and English. Avianna Diaz is the female lead of the fifth book, “Golden Scenery of Tomorrow.” The story ran from November 2020 to November 2021.
I’m less sure about Louise. The first book of The University Series does have a female lead named Louisse (yes, this spelling), but from what I’ve seen she’s more often called by her nickname, “Luna.” This book ran on Wattpad from December 2019 to January 2020. Then somewhere between 2020 and 2021, it got published in paperback form, and a TV adaptation (streaming, not regular TV) came out in May 2023. Now I’m wondering if that affected the number of babies named Luna.
I really appreciate your site. It’s great to see people who like names as much as I do.
Thank you for doing all that research! :)
“Avianna Louise” such a specific combination — I’m sure we’ll figure out the source one day. (Maybe a TV character, or an influencer…?)
Avianna Louise appears to be a singer with a presence on TikTok. I don’t get TikTok, but that’s what pops up. It would have to be a really popular performer to prompt that big a jump in name usage. It also seems to have been used by Filipino-Americans. A names in general seem to be really popular right now in that country — Althea, Athena, Andrea, Angel, etc. i wonder if Aviana and Avianna on their own are also more popular.
Thank you for taking a look, Andrea!
I’m also very curious about the usage of Avian(n)a (by itself) in the Philippines right now. I wish the country released more than just the top 10 names!
I’m seeing various people named “Avian(n)a Louise” on each of the social media platforms, but none of them seem popular/influential enough to have affected baby names a couple of years ago.
I couldn’t find any news articles about a famous Filipina Avianna Louise, so it’s something of a mystery. It had to have been a TV or movie character if it wasn’t a TikTok influencer. Nothing else would cause that big an increase in use.