Josephine
Josephine is a girls' name of French origin meaning “God will increase.” It ranked #52 in the United States in 2025. Josephine is the French feminine form of Joseph.
how do you pronounce Josephine?
JO-seh-feen
Hear it spoken aloud with our AI pronunciation tool.
what does Josephine mean?
The name Josephine means “God will increase.” It comes from the French language tradition.
Josephine is the French feminine form of Joseph. Empress Josephine de Beauharnais, Napoleon's first wife, gave it romantic grandeur. Jo March from 'Little Women' added literary spunk. It has been steadily climbing into the top 50.
where does the name Josephine come from?
A French feminine form of Joseph, from the Hebrew Yosef, meaning he will add or may God increase. French built it by adding the diminutive -ine, so the construction parallels Adeline and Caroline.
the history of Josephine
Joséphine de Beauharnais, first wife of Napoleon and Empress of the French, made the name fashionable across nineteenth-century Europe. Josephine Baker gave it a very different life in the twentieth — dancer, wartime agent for the French Resistance, and civil rights campaigner, reinterred in the Panthéon in 2021. The name returned to the American top hundred after 2000.
how popular is this name?
| Year | Rank |
|---|---|
| 2024 | #52 |
| 2023 | #58 |
| 2022 | #64 |
| 2021 | #72 |
| 2020 | #80 |
Source: SSA National Baby Names Dataset
what are the nicknames and variants of Josephine?
Nicknames
Variants around the world
who are famous people named Josephine?
- Josephine Bonaparte (Empress of France)
- Josephine Baker (American-French entertainer)
- Jo March (Little Women character)
what names are similar to Josephine?
what names go well with Josephine?
Sibling names that share Josephine's rhythm and register without echoing it too closely.
Last reviewed April 30, 2026 · Curated by HushName editorial
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