Named after the Jannowitzbrücke, a bridge named after the man behind it.
In 1821 the cotton manufacturer Christian August Jannowitz founded a company to build a bridge (Brücke) over the Spree; the wooden bridge was completed in 1822 and users paid a toll. Jannowitz himself proposed the name, which the king approved in 1824. The U-Bahn station was a closed ‘ghost station’ from 1961 until it reopened in November 1989.