Shealeigh
A variant spelling of the Irish name Shelagh meaning "blind from birth."
Name Census estimates that about 139 living Americans carry the first name Shealeigh. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Shealeigh today is around 20 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Shealeigh births was 2008 (15 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Shealeigh. 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.
People living today
139
~ 1 in 2,465,859 Americans
Peak year
2008
15 babies that year
Average age
20
years old
2021 SSA rank
#13,272
Tracked since 1989
Popularity
Shealeigh: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Shealeigh 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 75 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
Shealeigh 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 Shealeigh during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Origin
Meaning and history of Shealeigh
The name Shealeigh is a modern variant of the traditional Irish name Síle, which is itself derived from the Latin name Caelia. The name Caelia has its roots in the ancient Roman world, where it was borne by members of the celebrated Caelia gens, a patrician family of the Roman Republic.
Síle first appeared in Irish records during the Middle Ages, and it is believed to have been adopted as a Gaelic form of the Latin Caelia. The shift from Caelia to Síle likely occurred due to the influence of the Gaelic language's unique pronunciation patterns and spelling conventions.
The oldest recorded instance of the name Síle can be found in the Annals of Ulster, a chronicle of medieval Irish history. Here, a woman named Síle ingen Amalgaid, daughter of Amalgaid mac Congalaig, is mentioned as having died in the year 737 AD.
Throughout Irish history, several notable individuals have borne the name Síle. One of the most famous was Síle Ní Ghadhra, an Irish noblewoman and poet who lived in the late 16th century and was renowned for her compositions in the Irish language.
Another notable Síle was Síle Ní Raghailligh, a 17th-century Irish folk hero and outlaw who became legendary for her daring exploits against English forces during the Confederate Wars of the 1640s.
As the name evolved and spread beyond Ireland, it acquired various spellings and anglicized forms, including Sheila, Sheelah, and the more modern Shealeigh. One of the earliest recorded instances of the spelling Shealeigh can be found in the late 18th century, when a woman named Shealeigh O'Mahony was born in County Cork, Ireland, in 1785.
In more recent times, the name Shealeigh has been borne by several notable individuals, including Shealeigh Gilmore, an American actress and model born in 1977, and Shealeigh Wright, a Canadian singer and songwriter born in 1983.
People
Shealeigh + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Shealeigh 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
Shealeigh: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Shealeigh?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 139 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Shealeigh 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 2,465,859 US residents.
Is Shealeigh a common name?
We classify Shealeigh as "Very Rare". It ranks above 69.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 141 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Shealeigh most popular?
The single biggest year for Shealeigh was 2008, when 15 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Shealeigh is about 20 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
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 Shealeigh in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Shealeigh a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Shealeigh 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 Shealeigh still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Shealeigh 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 Shealeigh 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.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only covers names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files do not have a published Census demographic snapshot. In those cases, the page still shows the SSA trend, gender history, and state data.
How many people have Shealeigh as a first name?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.