PHOTOS: The Most Popular Boys & Girls' Names in Europe will amaze you!

Most popular boy names in the EU Member States, Norway, Switzerland, England & Wales in 2021 For boys, Noah is the most given first name in the largest number of countries.

It is at the top of the list in six countries, almost all of which border each other: Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and Sweden, but also Switzerland and England and Wales combined. 

Most popular girl names in the EU Member States, Norway, Switzerland, England & Wales in 2021 

For girls, Maria is the top name in the most countries. Four scattered countries - Bulgaria, Cyprus, Finland and Portugal - have seen more Marias born than any other country. 

To these countries we could add Greece with Maria and Romania with the compound name Ana-Maria. Then comes Emma in Luxembourg, Malta and the Netherlands (and Ema in Slovakia); Mia, the most popular name in three countries - Croatia, Estonia and Switzerland; and Sofija in Latvia and Lithuania. 

Expanding to the Russian city of Moscow, we find a variant of Sophia at the top of the list for girls. 

For boys, Alexander continues to be the most popular name for the past 30 years, with the exception of Artem in 2012. 

The most common first names in Europe It is difficult to define the name given to the largest number of babies in the European Union. The various national statistical institutes do not provide the same data. They range from 1,625 names with the number of births in Belgium to only the top 5 (without the number of births) in Greece. 

Another difficulty is the variation in the spelling of the same name from one country to another - even within the same country in some cases, such as Alexander, Aleksander, Alexender or Jasmine, Yasmina, Jasmin, Yasmeen. 

On the other hand, it is possible to count the number of times a given name appears in the official lists of all the countries observed (European Union, Norway, Switzerland, England and Wales). 

Euronews Culture compiled the spellings of the same first name and counted the number of times it appeared in the lists, in order to establish which are the most recurrent first names in Europe. 

As each variant is counted for one occurrence, and a given name may appear more times than there are countries. This is the case for the two most common first names for each gender: Lucas appears 42 times under all its variants, and Sofia appears 56 times under its various spellings. We have kept the most common spelling in our top list below. 

Amongst boys, we note the large recurrence of the name Matthew. 

Due to different variants despite a common root (Matteo, Matias, Mattia, Matthew, Matej, Matti, Mats, Matwij, Mattis, Matto, Mattes, Matt, Mathieu, Matas), the name holds 101 occurrences. 

Here is the Top 10 list for the most common boys' names in Europe: 

Lucas - 42 

Alexander - 30 

Oliver / Olivier - 23 

Mohammed - 22 

Noah - 21 

Elias - 21 

Matteo - 20 

Gabriel - 18 

Daniel, Liam, Benjamin - 17 

Ryan, Martin, David, Leo, Adam, Theodor, Viktor - 16 

Here is the Top 10 list for the most common girls' names in Europe: 

Sofia - 56 

Hanna - 51 

Maria - 34 

Isabella - 33 

Amelia - 30 

Jasmina - 29 

Emma - 27 

Emilia - 27 

Sara - 26 

Elisabeth - 25 

The 10 most popular baby names for boys and girls per country 

With the exception of Greece, Euronews Culture was able to obtain the 10 or more most given names in each country.