Shaylen
A feminine name of unknown meaning or origin.
Name Census estimates that about 601 living Americans carry the first name Shaylen. It is a predominantly female name (94.8% of registrations). The average person named Shaylen today is around 22 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Shaylen births was 2002 (45 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Shaylen. 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.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Shaylen with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
601
~ 1 in 570,307 Americans
Peak year
2002
45 babies that year
Average age
22
years old
2008 SSA rank
#10,851
Tracked since 1984
Census
Shaylen in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 602 people with the first name Shaylen, which placed it at #18,028 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#18,028
National first-name rank
People counted
602
602 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
51.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Shaylen
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shaylen is White at 51.8%. The next largest groups are Black (17.1%) and Two or More Races (10.3%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Shaylen described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Shaylen at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White51.8% · 312
- Black or African American17.1% · 103
- Two or more races10.3% · 62
- Asian and Pacific Islander9.5% · 57
- Hispanic or Latino8.5% · 51
- American Indian and Alaska Native2.8% · 17
Gender
Gender distribution for Shaylen
Shaylen leans heavily female at 94.8% of total registrations, but 32 boys have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Shaylen as a male name
- Ranked #10,851 in 2008
- 7 male births in 2008
- Peak: 1993 (7 births)
Shaylen as a female name
- Ranked #17,264 in 2024
- 5 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2002 (39 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Shaylen leans strongly female. 512 people counted with this name were female (85.3%), compared with 88 male bearers (14.7%).
Popularity
Shaylen: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Shaylen from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 299 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 2000s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Shaylen 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 Shaylen during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Shaylens live
Origin
Meaning and history of Shaylen
The name Shaylen is of English origin, derived from the Old English word "scealic," which means "a hut or temporary dwelling." The name is believed to have first appeared in the 7th century AD, during the Anglo-Saxon period in England.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Shaylen can be found in the Domesday Book, a record of land ownership in England compiled in 1086 by order of King William the Conqueror. The name is listed as "Scealinc," referring to a person living in a temporary shelter or hut.
In the 12th century, the name Shaylen appeared in the Middle English romance poem "Sir Gawain and the Green Knight." The poem mentions a character named "Schaylen the Shepherd," who is described as a loyal servant to King Arthur.
During the Renaissance period, a notable figure named Shaylen was Shaylen Holinshed (1529-1580), an English chronicler and historian. His work, "Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland," was a significant source of information for writers such as William Shakespeare.
In the 18th century, Shaylen Talbot (1700-1768) was a prominent English lawyer and politician who served as Lord Chancellor of Great Britain from 1737 to 1737.
Another historical figure with the name Shaylen was Shaylen Gardiner (1809-1886), an American educator and advocate for women's rights. She founded the Troy Female Seminary in New York, one of the first institutions in the United States to offer higher education to women.
Throughout history, the name Shaylen has maintained its English roots and has been used by a diverse range of individuals, from writers and historians to politicians and educators.
People
Shaylen + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Shaylen as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with S
Other first names starting with S with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Shaylen: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Shaylen?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 601 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Shaylen 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 570,307 US residents.
Is Shaylen a common name?
We classify Shaylen as "Very Rare". It ranks above 86.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 612 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Shaylen most popular?
The single biggest year for Shaylen was 2002, when 45 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Shaylen is about 22 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Shaylen in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 602 people with the name Shaylen, or 0.20 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #18,028 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Shaylen in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Shaylen?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Shaylen leans strongly female. 512 people counted with this name were female (85.3%), compared with 88 male bearers (14.7%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Shaylen?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Shaylen is White at 51.8%. The next largest groups are Black (17.1%) and Two or More Races (10.3%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Shaylen most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Shaylen in the 2020 Census, accounting for 51.8% (312 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Shaylen in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Shaylen a female name?
Yes, 94.8% of people registered as Shaylen 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.
Is Shaylen still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Shaylen in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Shaylen can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
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.
How common is the name Shaylen?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.