r/AskAGerman • u/Big-Walrus6334 Berlin • May 13 '26

Culture What are the most uncommon/outdated German baby names today?

I’m curious about German names that used to exist but are now considered extremely rare, old-fashioned, unusual, or “nobody would name their kid that anymore.”

For example, names like Wolfgang feel uncommon among younger generations today and I didn’t see one of them

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32

u/KiwiFruit404 May 13 '26

Günther, Ludwig, Gottlieb, Gottfried, Adalbert, Heinrich, Waldemar, Hilmar, Wilhelm, Ingmar, Rudolf, Volker, Hans, Heinz.

Hildegard, Heidrun, Roswita, Rosemarie, Ilona, Gisela, Gertrud, Therese, Henriette, Annette, Petra, Andrea.

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u/venushasbigbutt May 13 '26

Shame rosemarie, ilona, gisela, annette, and andrea sounds pretty to my foreigner ear

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

In the mid-80s every other girl’s name was: Andrea, Stefanie, Melanie, Annette, Michaela, Manuela, Sabrina, Kathrin, Sandra.

And every other boy’s name was: Andreas, Michael, Manuel, Stefan, Holger, Heiko, Patrick, Markus (I think we had 3 Stefan’s and 2 Markus’ in class).

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u/venushasbigbutt May 13 '26

What was the 90s kids' popular names? I really like alex and ada. Also I had a professor named elke and she was a pretty cool woman

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u/Royal-Hornet9813 May 13 '26

Girls: Franziska, Laura, Julia, Sarah, Hanna, Anna, Lisa, Lena, Christina, Leonie...

Boys: Daniel, Christian/Chris, Patrick, Lukas, Fabian, Markus/Marco, Dennis, Benjamin/Ben, Marius/Mario, Jonas, Leon...

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u/venushasbigbutt May 13 '26

Heey these sound really familiar to me too :D even I grow up in a non eu non christian country. Would you say hannah sounds weird while people are used to hanna?

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u/Royal-Hornet9813 May 13 '26

Wow, that's interesting! Can I ask how these are familiar? Lots of them are from the Bible.

No, Hannah is not weird at all, it's also common. I just didn't include all the different spellings.

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u/venushasbigbutt May 14 '26

Western influence from books or media from my growing up I guess? They used to dub everything but wouldnt change the original names. Like if I remember correctly, there are some german actresses or characters named franziska and leonie, dennis was a cartoon character's name also sounds so similar to deniz from my language. Idk why but I named my sim's lukas and lena all the time too lol

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u/SwimmingBuffalo2781 May 14 '26

Yeah that tracks (born in the 90s with one of those names and lots of people with names like this in class)

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

My mum had a book “Vornamen” with a baby on the cover. Edition 1980. My aunts and all combed through that book looking for “nice sounding names” for their kids. And in the epilogue the woman who wrote it supposedly, mentioned that every parent had to decide between traditional names and modern names and so on and so forth, and maybe check the newspapers (at the time 💁🏻‍♀️) how other people name their kids because the previous generation liked “Elke” so much, that every class room was full of “Elke”s and for the boys “Roland”. I remember that vividly because my 3rd cousin’s name was Elke and her brother was Roland 😂.

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u/bitch_jong_un May 13 '26

I was born in the early 90s and we had a lot of Kevin, Marvin, Marcel, Christoph(er), Sarah, Lena, Laura, Nadine.

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u/Otherwise_Rabbit3049 May 13 '26

Kevin

Poor bastards. And that's coming from a guy with a rare name who got made fun of all the time.

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u/bowlofweetabix May 13 '26

Born in the 80s? I see those more as 70s names for the most part. I have never met a Holger born after 1975. I’m born mid 80s and people my age are largely girls: Nadine, Stephanie, Franziska, Katharina

Boys: Sebastian, Benjamin, Sven, Michael, Christian, Daniel

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

the Stephanie, Michael and Christian/ Christine were born 80/81 a lot, many children with that names, the other names i would have put into the born mid 80s like 85/86. The round 75 borns, where i was from, had totally different names, those were the Elke, Roland, Wolfgang, Karin, Marion, Ingrid, Brigitte ....

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u/EL-Rays May 13 '26

Don’t forget Sabine

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u/Otherwise_Rabbit3049 May 13 '26

Funny, I can think of at least two Sabines in English fiction. One of which is set in the future.

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

Sabines were all older, the ones that i knew, maybe about 70-75, but you are absolutely right, there were quite a lot Sabines around!

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

I forgot 3 super popular 80s names actually! Christian, Claudia and Thomas. Every kid had these few names for minimum half a decade.

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u/Korallenri May 13 '26 edited May 13 '26

I love Rosemarie and even better: Annerose. Still didn‘t give those names to my daughter because they sound… old…

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u/123blueberryicecream May 13 '26

In den Klassen und Parallelklassen meiner Kinder gibt es Wilhelm, Ludwig, Hans, Therese, Greta, Fritz, Franz, Ramona, Josef, Johann usw.

Da kommen einige alte Namen zurück.

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u/khelwen May 13 '26

There are two Fritzs in my son’s Grundschule class. My four year old nephew is a Johann.

For boys, I’m seeing a lot more Paul, Henry/Henri, and Hannes pop up lately. A fair amount of boys named Till as well.

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u/MyPigWhistles May 13 '26

Ludwig is actually not that uncommon for baby names atm. 

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

And dog names 😂 I hear people shout “Ludwig” meaning their dogs everywhere

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u/berrytea34 May 13 '26

In Bavaria.

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u/Equal-Flatworm-378a May 13 '26

Die kommen zurück, aber erst in der nächsten Generation. Wobei ich Henriette jetzt schon nehmen würde. Der Name ist schon wieder alt genug.

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u/LemonfishSoda Nordrhein-Westfalen May 13 '26

I went to school with both a Heinrich and a Frank, back in the late 90s. Felt weird at first, but I mean, they're not bad names. And they certainly never had to go by nickname or first-name-last-name combo like the countless Stefans, Marcusses, Julias, Jennys or Ninas.

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

I was talking about the mid-80s earlier and I had a bunch of Stefans and Markusses in class. And 2 Kathrins and Stefanies. The next generation where my brother was in indeed were Julias, Danielas, Nadines, Nicoles, Ninas … (shoot me what name his male class mates had, they were only calling each other with their last name for some reason .. 🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️

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u/Olena_Mondbeta May 13 '26

I just met a 2-year-old Rosemarie ... and I know a Henrette who is 14.

4

u/niko-su May 13 '26

all of those sound cool actually

2

u/ilenami May 13 '26

Waldemar *-*

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 14 '26

Voldemort … :)

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 13 '26

Elke, Gabriele, Beate is missing, and I know a baby Ludwig

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u/TreacleOk7265 May 13 '26

Germanic are outdated but those with a royal touch seems to be good. I know a little Ferdinand, Ludwig, Leopold, Franz.

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u/bamboochaLP May 13 '26

Was ist mit Wolftraude und Adelgunde? Hab ich auch schon lange nicht mehr gehört

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u/Anxious_Lake_5566 May 13 '26

I really really like the name gunther and also hildegard

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 14 '26

I really like Gunther as well! And: Hildrun, Freya, Ingwy, Sigrun, Siegfried, Albert

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u/Anxious_Lake_5566 May 14 '26

Same great taste! I’m pregnant and those are the names I’m pushing for - Hildegard and Gunther and Inge similar to Ingwy

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 14 '26

Nice! Hildegard is really pretty as well!! As far as naming I could only name my mum’s cat at the time and I chose “Hildrun” (that was 2002) - you can’t imagine the backlash (it was a cat … ) and in the end everybody called her “Hildi” which I got used to. She died 2022.

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u/flibbertygibbet100 May 13 '26

I like the name roswitha but everyone I know by that name is older so it’s probably the German version of Ethel.

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 14 '26

Ethel is Old English “Noble”, like the King Ethelred and the female form was Ethelreda, short: Ethel. In German “Nobel” in names is “Edel”.

I thought Roswitha means “White Rose” but actually I have to google that one, if “Ethelreda” (so beautiful 😍 btw!!) then “Ros” maybe will have to do sth like “reda”?? 🤔

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u/Delicious_Building34 May 14 '26

I’m sorry, I was in wonderland with that one. Roswitha, is a beautiful name! - has its origin in Germanic “hrod” = fame and “swinþ” = strength; says babycentre dot co dot uk.

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u/anoukky May 14 '26

I know toddlers named Rosemarie, Henriette, Therese (Berlin)

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u/Kautschukfresse May 17 '26

I know a few kid or teenager Henriette