Alainah
Feminine
The h at the end of Alainah is doing nothing at all to the sound. It is doing something to the look: the same silent flourish that turned Nora into Norah and Hana into Hannah, borrowed from names where the h was earned — Sarah, Deborah, Delilah — and lent to names where it was not.
How old is the name Alainah?
Alainah first appears in US birth records in 1991 — 34 years ago. The typical Alainah alive today was born around 2012, making them about 13 years old. About 500 people named Alainah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Alainah most popular?
Alainah peaked in 2011, reaching #3843 nationally. Today it ranks #10917, 7,074 places below that high. See the whole 2011 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Alan to Alainah
The story of Alainah
Alan came to England with the Bretons who arrived alongside the Normans, and it was common there within a century. It has been reworked many times since: Allen and Allan in English, Alain in French, and a whole set of feminines built in English rather than in Breton — Alana, Alanna, Alaine, Alayna, Alaina. Alainah is the most recent layer, an American respelling with a decorative h. One near neighbor is not related to any of it: the Anglo-Irish alannah, a term of endearment written into nineteenth-century novels, comes from a leanbh, my child, and has nothing to do with Alan at all.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Alainah respells Alaina, the feminine of Alan, and Alan has no agreed meaning. Three readings are offered: a Breton word for rock, a Breton word for handsome, and the ethnic name of the Alans, a people who settled in Gaul and Brittany in late antiquity. None has been established. The name is older than the explanations for it.
How the name formed
- Alan
- Alain
- Alaina
- Alainah
Related forms: Alain · Alan · Ailean · Alaina
Pronouncing Alainah
uh-LAY-nuh
Three syllables, stress on the second. The h is silent. So is the i: it belongs to the French Alain, where it changes the vowel entirely, and here it does no work at all.
Nicknames for Alainah
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1991
- Most girls named
- 201139 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #3843reached in 2011
- Change vs 2024
- −42.9%8 in 2025, from 14
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Alainah in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Alain in French — related form
- Alan in Breton — related form
- Ailean in Scottish Gaelic — related form
- Alaina in English — spelling variant
Alainahs among us
people named Alainah are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 200,908 born in 2025 was named Alainah
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Alainah
- #10917
- Alainah on the 2025 chart
- #127
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Alainah went to 8 girls in 2025, but Alaina, Alayna and Alaynna and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 7 spellings went to 2,363, which makes it the 127th most-given girls’ name of the year — 10,790 places above the chart.
and 1 rarer spelling.
About 1 girl in 680 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 200,908 for Alainah itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Ronya test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Alainah's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Ronya climbed just as high around 1967, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Ronya's path sketches the road Alainah is walking now.
Alainah sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Alainah beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Alainah in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The sound is completely familiar even though the spelling is not.
- Lainey works immediately as a short form and stands alone as a name.
- The name underneath is used across French, English and Gaelic.
- The h will be left off by almost everyone, including forms, teachers and doctors.
- At least five spellings compete for this sound, so it will be spelled out every time it is given.
- The meaning is not established, which matters if the meaning is why you chose it.
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What they receive
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Alainah
Feminine · #10917 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Alainahs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 500 people named Alainah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Alainah?
- Alainah is one of 6 recorded spellings. Alaina is the more common one — 1,366 births in 2025 against 8 for Alainah.
- How popular is the name Alainah in 2025?
- Alainah ranks #10917 among US girl names in 2025, with 8 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Alainah?
- About 1 in every 200,908 US girls born in 2025 was named Alainah — 8 in all.
- Will my child share the name Alainah with classmates?
- Alainah will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Alainah
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Edythe#10917 · Tessie#10917 · Drusilla#10917 · Eugenie#10917 · Ivah#10917 · Karri#10917 · Claribel#10917 · Myrtle#10917
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Alainah? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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