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Shem Tov · Hebrew names

Girl's nameOrigin: biblicalIn Israel: steady

RuthIn Hebrew: רות · meaning, pronunciation and popularity in Israel

With vowel points: רוּתRomanization: rut

Ruth (Hebrew: רות) is a girl's name of biblical origin. 28,787 people born in Israel between 1949 and 2024 have it today, according to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). In 2024 it was given to 602 girls and ranked #24. Its peak year was 2023, with 696 babies.

People in Israel
28,787
born 1949–2024
Babies in 2024
602
rank #24
Peak year
2023
696 babies
USA, 2025
1,781
rank #173

Writing and saying Ruth

In Hebrew letters the name is רות, read right to left. Ruth is the Latin spelling recorded by our review; families choose their own spelling in passports, so you may also meet other forms. Wiktionary romanizes it as "rut" (the accent marks the stressed syllable).

Meaning and origin

  • a female given name, Ruth
  • Ruth (a book of the Old Testament and the Hebrew Tanakh)
  • Ruth (the resident of Moab around whom the text centers)

Quoted from English Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0), unchanged.

Ruth 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).

Ruth: rate per 10,000, 1950–2025

per 10,000 babies of the same sex

Ruth in English-speaking countries

Ruth in each official list: latest year, count, rank and peak
Country / regionYearBabiesRankPeak
United States20251,781#1731920 (26,102)
United Kingdom202580#5411997 (410)
England and Wales202573#5421996 (381)
Scotland20254#6321977 (125)
Northern Ireland20253#3971998 (32)
Ireland202517#2491977 (201)
British Columbia202310#3211948 (57)
Alberta202523#1802016 (26)
Quebec20255#7731981 (17)

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

Related Israeli names

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

Questions about Ruth

How do you write Ruth in Hebrew?

Ruth is written רות in Hebrew (with vowel points: רוּת). Hebrew is read right to left. A dictionary romanization is "rut".

How many people in Israel are named Ruth?

28,787 people born between 1949 and 2024 carry the name רות: 28,787 women and 0 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 Ruth a boy's or a girl's name?

In Israel it is almost always a girl's name: 100.0% of the people named רות are women.

What does the name Ruth mean?

English Wiktionary describes it as: "a female given name, Ruth"

Is Ruth used outside Israel?

The name Ruth appears in the official baby name lists of English-speaking countries. In the United States 1,781 girls were given it in 2025 (#173), per the Social Security Administration. In the UK 80 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.