Joni appears 59 times in the registries at rank 1722, strongly female. The name is essentially inseparable from Joni Mitchell — the Canadian singer-songwriter who defined a certain kind of searching, literary, folk-inflected femininity in the late 1960s and 1970s and has never really gone out of cultural relevance.
The Joni Mitchell Effect
Mitchell's resurgence over the past decade — driven by documentary coverage, her Grammys performance comeback, and intergenerational rediscovery — has made Joni feel both vintage and current simultaneously. Owners naming their pet Joni are almost always making a conscious reference, even if unstated. It's a name that communicates aesthetic values: folk sensibility, introspection, a specific kind of feminine independence. Joni sits alongside Joan (Jett, Baez) in the mid-century music-icon pet register.
Human-Pet Crossover
On the human side, Joni is genuinely uncommon: rare enough that a pet named Joni rarely competes for attention in social settings. The name has the pleasant quality of sounding familiar without being overused in either the pet or human registry. It's a clean pick for owners who want cultural depth without obviousness.
Counter-Reading
Joni is feminine enough that it reads awkwardly on male pets, despite being technically available. The Mitchell association also assumes a level of cultural familiarity that won't mean anything to every person who meets your dog — which is fine, but the reference is not universal.