Sheniya
A feminine name of Slavic origin meaning "gift from God".
Name Census estimates that about 98 living Americans carry the first name Sheniya. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Sheniya today is around 22 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Sheniya births was 2006 (12 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Sheniya. 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 Sheniya with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Fewer than 100 living Americans are believed to carry the name Sheniya. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
98
~ 1 in 3,497,493 Americans
Peak year
2006
12 babies that year
Average age
22
years old
2016 SSA rank
#18,478
Tracked since 1996
Popularity
Sheniya: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Sheniya from the 1990s through to the 2010s, spanning 3 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 74 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
Sheniya 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 Sheniya 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 Sheniya
The name Sheniya is believed to have originated from the Sanskrit language, which is an ancient Indo-Aryan language that dates back to the 2nd millennium BCE. The name is derived from the Sanskrit word "śreṇī," which means "class," "group," or "category." In the early days of Hinduism and Buddhism, the term "śreṇī" was used to refer to guilds or associations of artisans, merchants, or professionals.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Sheniya can be found in the Mahabharata, a Sanskrit epic poem that dates back to around the 8th century BCE. In the Mahabharata, Sheniya is mentioned as the name of a warrior who fought alongside the Pandava princes during the great Kurukshetra war.
In the 4th century BCE, a Buddhist nun named Sheniya is mentioned in the Therigatha, a collection of verses written by early Buddhist nuns. This Sheniya is said to have attained enlightenment and is revered as an Arhat, or a perfected being, in the Buddhist tradition.
During the Gupta Empire, which ruled over much of northern and central India between the 4th and 6th centuries CE, a famous musician and composer named Sheniya is mentioned in several historical records. He is credited with creating new ragas and compositions that influenced the development of Indian classical music.
In the 11th century, a renowned Hindu philosopher and scholar named Sheniya Sambhu wrote several treatises on Advaita Vedanta, a branch of Hindu philosophy that emphasizes the unity of all existence and the oneness of the individual soul with the ultimate reality.
Another notable figure with the name Sheniya was Sheniya Bai, a 17th-century female warrior and ruler from the Bundela clan in central India. She is celebrated for her bravery and military prowess, as she led her troops in several battles against the Mughal Empire and successfully defended her kingdom.
People
Sheniya + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Sheniya 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
Sheniya: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Sheniya?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 98 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Sheniya 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 3,497,493 US residents.
Is Sheniya a common name?
We classify Sheniya as "Very Rare". It ranks above 64.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 100 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Sheniya most popular?
The single biggest year for Sheniya was 2006, when 12 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Sheniya is about 22 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 Sheniya in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Sheniya a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Sheniya 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 Sheniya still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Sheniya 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 Sheniya 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 the name Sheniya?
See how many people have the name Sheniya on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.