Ariela
A feminine Hebrew name meaning "lion of God".
Name Census estimates that about 3,610 living Americans carry the first name Ariela. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Ariela today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ariela births was 2024 (212 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ariela. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
Key insights
- • Ariela is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 15 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
3.6K
~ 1 in 94,946 Americans
Peak year
2024
212 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,138
Tracked since 1971
Popularity
Ariela: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ariela from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 1,345 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Ariela remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ariela by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Ariela during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Arielas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 21 states and territories. California, New York, Texas recorded the most babies named Ariela, while Tennessee, Oregon, New Mexico recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 109 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Ariela
The name Ariela is a Hebrew name derived from the word "Ariel," which means "lion of God." It is a feminine version of the name Ariel and has been in use since ancient times in the Jewish community.
The earliest recorded use of the name Ariela can be traced back to the Bible, where it is mentioned as the name of a daughter of one of the sons of Gad. In the Book of Numbers, chapter 26, verse 17, the name Ariela is listed among the descendants of Gad.
During the Middle Ages, the name Ariela was commonly used among Jewish communities in Europe and the Middle East. One of the earliest recorded individuals with this name was Ariela Bat Yitzhak, a Jewish scholar who lived in Spain in the 12th century.
In the 16th century, the name Ariela gained popularity in Italy, particularly among Jewish families. One notable figure from this time was Ariela Nazzari, an Italian-Jewish writer and poet who lived in the city of Ferrara in the late 1500s.
As the name spread throughout Europe, it also found its way to England. In the 17th century, Ariela Browne was a well-known English writer and translator who published works on various subjects, including religion and philosophy.
In the 19th century, the name Ariela became more widely used outside of the Jewish community. One prominent figure was Ariela Caselli, an Italian painter and sculptor who was active in the late 1800s and known for her portraits and religious works.
Another notable individual with the name Ariela was Ariela Warshel, an Israeli-American chemist who was born in 1940 and later won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2013 for her work on the development of computational methods in chemistry.
People
Ariela + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ariela as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Ariela: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ariela?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 3,610 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ariela going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 94,946 US residents.
Is Ariela a common name?
We classify Ariela as "Rare". It ranks above 95.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 3,663 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ariela most popular?
The single biggest year for Ariela was 2024, when 212 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ariela is about 15 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
Is Ariela a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Ariela in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.