Tessa: Meaning of Baby Name Tessa

About the Name Tessa

Tessa originated as a Greek and Italian short form of Theresa (or Tereza), descending from the Greek therizo meaning "to harvest" or "to gather." The name's Christian anchor is Saint Teresa of Ávila (1515–1582), the Spanish Carmelite mystic and theologian, and the more recent Saint Teresa of Calcutta (Mother Teresa, 1910–1997, the Albanian-Indian Catholic missionary).

The shorter Tessa has been used in English-speaking countries since the 19th century, transitioning from nickname to standalone first name in 20th-century American naming. Notable bearers include British actress Tessa Thompson (born 1983, the American actress known for Marvel's Valkyrie and various other roles), British author Tessa Hadley, and contemporary American actress Tessa Mossey.

Tessa's contemporary American climb is part of the broader vintage-revival wave alongside Sadie and Hattie. The name climbed from outside the US top 500 in 1995 to the US top 200 girls' rank by 2014 and the top 200 since. The name's appeal is its compact warm register — two short syllables, soft consonants, instantly readable, and the in-built friendly-vintage register from the underlying Theresa root. The name reads as both classical-Christian and contemporary American. Common nicknames are scarce since Tessa is itself a nickname-shape — Tess (the dominant short form, casual and adult, also a popular standalone name), and the rare Tessie each carry distinct registers; the longer formal Theresa or Teresa is sometimes used as Tessa's official-document version. International forms include Theresa (English/German), Teresa (Italian/Spanish/Portuguese), Thérèse (French, with accent), and the original Greek Therezos.

Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.

Quick Facts About Tessa

1,029

Greek baby names in our dictionary

545

Greek female names

206

5-letter T-names in our dictionary

369

T-female names total

2000–2025

years of US SSA records (26 total)

33,252

total US births named Tessa (all years)

US Popularity History (2000–2025)

↘️ Falling: Tessa dropped 32 places in the US girls ranking over the last 5 years (#279 in 2020 → #311 in 2025).

Annual US births named Tessa by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 2007 with 1,753 girls named Tessa (girl rank #190 that year).

Where it stands today: in 2025, ranked #311 for girls (978 US births). That's 121 places below its 2007 peak.

Source: US Social Security Administration. Limitations: US birth-certificate data only; names appearing fewer than 5 times in a given year are suppressed for privacy; spelling variants are counted separately. For names that ranked outside the US top 100 before year 2000, only the years they reached the top 100 are shown — the chart may have gaps for less-popular historical names.

Where in the US Is Tessa Most Popular?

Average girl-name rank within each state across 2016–2025 SSA records. A lower number means the name appears closer to the top of that state's girls-name rankings — a per-capita measure that isn't biased toward large states. For Tessa the strongest states are Massachusetts, Utah, Connecticut.

Strongest girls-name states

#	State	Avg rank	Births
1	Massachusetts	#140	383
2	Utah	#156	258
3	Connecticut	#157	185
4	North Dakota	#159	22
5	Alaska	#161	23
6	Rhode Island	#168	36
7	New Jersey	#171	421
8	New Hampshire	#171	48
9	Illinois	#174	585
10	Delaware	#176	31

Weakest girls-name states

#	State	Avg rank	Births
1	Louisiana	#642	58
2	Mississippi	#546	30
3	Kentucky	#530	86
4	South Carolina	#492	92
5	Alabama	#471	106
6	Arkansas	#441	50
7	Oklahoma	#439	100
8	Georgia	#430	244
9	Arizona	#401	182
10	Texas	#399	762

Source: SSA state-level baby-name dataset 2016–2025. States with fewer than 3 years of data for Tessa in this window are excluded. Births < 5 in a given state-year are suppressed by SSA for privacy.

Variant Forms

Name	Meaning	Gender	Origin
Tess	Abbreviation Of Teresa Which Is A Popular Saint's Name Of Uncertain Meaning.	Female	English
Tessie	Abbreviation Of Teresa Which Is A Popular Saint's Name Of Uncertain Meaning.	Female	English

Famous People Named Tessa

1 notable figure from history and culture who share the name Tessa.

Tessa Sanderson was a famous sports personality, Tessa Sanderson, the first black women to win an Olympic gold and has founded a charitable sports training center.

Browse more famous Tessas and similar first names →

Looking for names like Tessa?

A dedicated page with 60+ related names — spelling variants, rhymes, alliterations, same-origin matches, and shared meaning concepts — lives at its own URL so each kind of similarity gets a deeper treatment than fits here.

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Compare Tessa to Other Popular Names

Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Tessa against today's most popular girls-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).

Tessa vs Olivia 210,124 births since 2014

Tessa vs Emma 202,477 births since 2014

Tessa vs Sophia 169,709 births since 2014

Tessa vs Isabella 158,431 births since 2014

Tessa vs Ava 157,356 births since 2014

Tessa vs Charlotte 151,872 births since 2014

Tessa vs Mia 149,779 births since 2014

Tessa vs Amelia 142,728 births since 2014

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