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Noah and Mia remain most popular Swiss baby names

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Noah and Mia remain most popular Swiss baby names
Photo: belchonockDepositphotos"

The most popular names given to babies in Switzerland in 2016 were Mia and Noah, according to the Swiss statistics office, which published its annual analysis on Monday.

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Among the 42,951 girls born in Switzerland in 2016, the most popular name was Mia, topping the table for the second year, followed by Emma and Elena. 
 
Noah was the trendy name among 2016’s 44,932 newborn boys, remaining Swiss parents’ top choice for the fourth year in a row. Gabriel and Luca took second and third place. 
 
Source: Swiss Statistics
 
Of course, Switzerland being a multilingual country, names varied according to the linguistic region. 
 
While Mia and Noah were the top choices of those in the Swiss German region, Emma and Gabriel were the preferred names of parents in French-speaking Switzerland. 
 
Sofia and Leonardo took the top spots in Italian-speaking regions, while Valentina and Laurin were preferred by Romansh speakers.
 
 
The trendy names of today are very different to those chosen 50 years ago, however. 
 
In a breakdown of first names for the entire Swiss population, the Swiss statistics office showed how name choices have evolved over the years.
 
In 1966 you would have encountered plenty of women called Barbara, Karin and Monika in Switzerland, while today those names are far less common. Conversely, 2016’s most popular girls’ name, Mia, was extremely rare 50 years ago.
 
 
Chart showing how names including Mia have become more popular over the past 50 years.
 
The most common first names in Switzerland within the population as a whole in 2016 were Daniel and Maria. 
 
Perennial favourites such as Peter and Anna also dominated the list, as did names that were popular during the baby boom years, such as Thomas. 
 
Source: Swiss Statistics
 
 

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