Arielle
Feminine · Hebrew roots · “lion of God”
Arielle is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 30,870 girls against 51 boys since 1880.
Arielle is the French-styled form of Ariel, a name written in Hebrew as two small pieces: ari, lion, and el, God. Shakespeare gave it to the air-spirit of The Tempest; the Hebrew Bible gives it to Jerusalem itself in the book of Isaiah. The doubled l and final e soften all of that into something that ends on a lift rather than a stop.
How old is the name Arielle?
Arielle first appears in US birth records in 1962 — 63 years ago. The typical Arielle alive today was born around 2006, making them about 19 years old. About 30,500 people named Arielle are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Arielle most popular?
Arielle peaked in 1991, reaching #183 nationally. Today it ranks #485, 302 places below that high. See the whole 1991 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Ariel (Hebrew) to Arielle
The story of Arielle
Ariel is a Hebrew name of real antiquity: it appears in the book of Ezra as a man's name and in Isaiah as a poetic title for Jerusalem, the city called lion of God. English readers met it again in Shakespeare's The Tempest, where Ariel is the spirit bound to Prospero, and later in Milton and in Pope's The Rape of the Lock — always airy, never leonine. French usage produced Arielle, a clearly feminine spelling, and that is the form that took hold in American records, arriving in the middle of the twentieth century. The 1989 animated film The Little Mermaid, whose heroine is Ariel, put the whole family of spellings in front of a very large audience at once, and Arielle rose with them.
Meaning
lion of God
From Hebrew ari (lion) plus el (God). Arielle is the feminine French spelling of that same name.
How the name formed
- ArielHebrew
- ArielEnglish
- Arielle
Related forms: אריאל / Ariel · Ariel · Ariela · Ariella · Ariel · Arielle
Pronouncing Arielle
ar-ee-EL
Three syllables with the weight on the last. Some American speakers say AIR-ee-el instead, with the stress up front, and both are heard for Ariel and Arielle alike.
Nicknames for Arielle
High
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
- 1962
- Most girls named
- 19911,631 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #183reached in 1991
- Change vs 2024
- +0.7%618 in 2025, from 614
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.
Arielle in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- אריאל / Ariel in Hebrew — transliteration
- Ariel in English — same name
- Ariela in Hebrew — related form
- Ariella in Italian — related form
- Ariel in Spanish — same name
- Arielle in French — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Arielles among us
people named Arielle are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 2,601 born in 2025 was named Arielle
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Lee test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Arielle's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Lee climbed just as high around 1955, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Lee's path sketches the road Arielle is walking now.
Arielle 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
Where Arielle is headed
Arielle is easing off slowly — about 16% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
High confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Arielle beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Arielle in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The short form Ari is established in several languages and works as a full name, so there is a ready everyday option.
- The base name Ariel is widely recognized in English from the Bible, Shakespeare and film, so nobody has to be told what the name is.
- A documented line running from Hebrew scripture through French to American usage — long, continuous, and not invented recently.
- Recognizable across Hebrew, French, Spanish and Italian, which travels well in a multilingual family.
- Arielle, Ariel, Ariella and Ariela all sound close and all exist, so she will spend her life spelling it out. Worth deciding which one you want on the birth certificate and sticking to it.
- Because of the 1989 film, many people hear the mermaid first. That association has faded with the generations but has not gone away.
- Ariel is a common man's name in Hebrew and in Spanish-speaking countries, so the -elle spelling is what signals a girl abroad — useful to know if the family spans both.
- Two stress patterns circulate in American English, so expect to correct people at first; most settle after one hearing.
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What they receive
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Arielle
Feminine · Hebrew roots · #485 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Arielles are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 30,500 people named Arielle are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Arielle in 2025?
- Arielle ranks #485 among US girl names in 2025, with 618 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Arielle?
- About 1 in every 2,601 US girls born in 2025 was named Arielle — 618 in all.
- Will my child share the name Arielle with classmates?
- Arielle will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Arielle
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Aniyah#485 · Alivia#484 · Cameron#487 · Ainsley#483 · Brooklynn#488 · Anahi#482 · Renata#481 · Aubree#489
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Arielle? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Arielle and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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