Emily · Daily fortune

Emily is a feminine name of Latin origin: the English feminine form of Aemilius, a Roman family name, and the counterpart of the masculine Emil. Wikipedia glosses the name "rival". Chaucer used the form Emelye in The Knight's Tale in the 14th century, but Behind the Name says the name was not common in English until the German House of Hanover came to the British throne in the 18th century, when Princess Amelia Sophia (1711–1786) was commonly called Emily in English even though Amelia is an unrelated name. Emily was the top girls' name in the United States from 1996 to 2007, and ranked #34 in 2025.

Behind the Name describes Emily as the "English feminine form of Aemilius (see Emil)", and Wikipedia agrees that it "is a feminine given name derived from the Roman family name 'Aemilius', and is the feminine form of the name Emil." Wikipedia gives the meaning of the Roman name as "rival"; the Behind the Name entry for Emily itself gives no gloss, pointing instead to its Emil entry, which was not fetched in this pass. Both sources note that the name is unrelated to Amelia, despite the two having been treated as interchangeable in 18th-century England.

The name's oldest English appearance in the sources is literary: Behind the Name notes that Chaucer used the form Emelye in his 14th-century Knight's Tale, one of The Canterbury Tales. It did not become common in the English-speaking world until after the German House of Hanover came to the British throne in the 18th century, when Princess Amelia Sophia (1711–1786) was commonly known as Emily in English; Wikipedia likewise credits Princess Amelia of Great Britain with the name's first English-speaking popularity. Behind the Name describes Emily as moderately popular through most of the 20th century and very popular around the turn of the 21st, when it was the highest-ranked girls' name in the United States from 1996 to 2007 and reached similar levels in other English-speaking countries. Wikipedia adds that this saturation gave the name an 'everywoman' image for women in their twenties, reflected in titles such as Emily in Paris and Emily the Criminal. Two 19th-century writers, Emily Brontë and Emily Dickinson, remain the name's best-known bearers.

Emily ranked #34 for girls in the United States in 2025 (Social Security Administration). Behind the Name records that it was the highest-ranked girls' name in the United States from 1996 to 2007 and reached similar levels in other English-speaking countries at the same time, after being moderately popular through most of the 20th century. Wikipedia adds that it ranked 31st in Canada in 2022.

English Emily is /ˈɛm.ə.li/, three syllables with the stress on the first. Most other languages use a form closer to the Latin Aemilia, usually Emilia or Emilie. The forms below are from the Behind the Name list of other-language equivalents; their pronunciations were not verified in this pass.

Emily is a soft, three-syllable classic whose main stylistic fact is its recent ubiquity: a girl named Emily today will share the name with a great many women born between the mid-1990s and late 2000s. That gives it a warm, familiar register rather than a fresh one, and it explains why some parents now reach for Emilia, Emmeline or Amelia to get the same sound with less company. It still carries strong literary associations through Brontë and Dickinson, and it works equally well in its full form and as Em or Emmy.

The name's namesakes lean towards writers, reformers and actresses. Only bearers named in the Behind the Name and Wikipedia entries consulted are listed.

Names that share Emily's soft sound, its Latin family-name origin, or its gentle literary register.