Recorded 1880–1998 · United States
Reta was most popular in 1946, when 192 American babies were given the name — ranking #1,017 that year. It was not recorded in 2025. Across 1880–2025 the Social Security Administration has recorded 8,616 people named Reta.
The Social Security Administration’s records begin in 1880, and Reta is already there in that first year — so the name is older than the record and these figures cannot date it. It has been recorded in 112 of the 146 years since. It was last recorded in 1998.
The Social Security Administration has recorded 8,616 American births named Reta between 1880 and 2025. That is recorded US births, not a world population — it counts people issued a Social Security number at birth in the United States. Of those, roughly 3,286 are estimated to be alive today.
Reta was not recorded in 2025. The SSA withholds any name given to fewer than five babies in a year, so fewer than five American babies were given it.
Across the whole record Reta is a girl’s name — 100.0% of the 8,616 Americans given it were girls and 0.0% were boys.
Counted from every US birth the Social Security Administration recorded under this name, so it reflects use rather than opinion. A name given to fewer than five babies of one sex in a year is withheld at source and is not counted.
Roughly 3,286 Americans named Reta are alive today — 38% of everyone ever recorded with the name. The median is 74 years old, and half are between 67 and 82.
An estimate, not a count. Recorded births are carried forward through the Social Security Administration’s 2023 period life table, by age and sex. That table describes mortality in one recent year, so it credits the oldest cohorts with today’s survival rather than the harsher rates they actually lived through — the further back a name peaked, the more this will overstate how many remain. It counts people issued a Social Security number at birth, not immigrants who arrived later.
A variant of Rita · Greek · short form of Margarita, "pearl"
How much more common the name is in each state than across the country as a whole.
See Reta on the interactive charts
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Source: U.S.A. Social Security Administration. Years 1880–2025. namelegacy.org