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Shem Tov · Hebrew names

Girl's nameOrigin: internationalIn Israel: hardly given today

MaraIn Hebrew: מרה · meaning, pronunciation and popularity in Israel

Mara (Hebrew: מרה) is a girl's name of international origin. 351 people born in Israel between 1949 and 2024 have it today, according to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Its peak year was 1949, with 26 babies.

People in Israel
351
born 1949–2024
Babies in 2024
—
not in the list
Peak year
1949
26 babies
USA, 2025
499
rank #587

Writing and saying Mara

In Hebrew letters the name is מרה, read right to left. Mara is the Latin spelling recorded in Wikidata; families choose their own spelling in passports, so you may also meet other forms.

We have no sourced English explanation of this name yet, so we do not guess one. The Hebrew page has our Hebrew notes when there are any.

Mara by year: Israel and abroad

How many girls out of every 10,000 born each year have the name. For Israel it counts the people born that year who carry the name today (the CBS counts residents by year of birth, not birth registrations).

Mara: rate per 10,000, 1950–2025

per 10,000 babies of the same sex

Mara in English-speaking countries

Mara in each official list: latest year, count, rank and peak
Country / regionYearBabiesRankPeak
United States2025499#5872021 (568)
United Kingdom2025118#3962024 (164)
England and Wales202574#5382024 (118)
Scotland202539#1132024 (42)
Northern Ireland20255#2902025 (5)
Ireland202512#3292024 (19)
British Columbia202312#2682021 (14)
Alberta202511#4062021 (12)
Quebec20256#6682005 (20)

Counts for girls. The Hebrew page for Mara has every year and the other spellings.

Related Israeli names

Spelling variants and names that look or sound close in Hebrew.

Questions about Mara

How do you write Mara in Hebrew?

Mara is written מרה in Hebrew. Hebrew is read right to left.

How many people in Israel are named Mara?

351 people born between 1949 and 2024 carry the name מרה: 331 women and 20 men. The count comes from the CBS table of current first names by year of birth; years with fewer than 5 people are not published.

Is Mara a boy's or a girl's name?

In Israel it is almost always a girl's name: 94.3% of the people named מרה are women.

Is Mara used outside Israel?

The name Mara appears in the official baby name lists of English-speaking countries. In the United States 499 girls were given it in 2025 (#587), per the Social Security Administration. In the UK 118 in 2025 (ONS, NRS and NISRA combined).

Sources

Israel: Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), current first names of people born 1949–2024 by sex, population group and year of birth, processed 2026-09-27. CBS publications.

Abroad

Counts are copied as published. We only merged accented spellings (Zoë = Zoe) and computed ranks and rates. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – British Columbia and the Open Government Licence – Alberta.