Esmerelda
Feminine · “emerald”
Esmeralda is an emerald. Spanish took the word from Greek by way of Latin, and a French novel of 1831 gave the name to a dancer in Paris whose story made it famous across Europe. Esmerelda with an e in the middle is the American respelling of the Spanish word.
How old is the name Esmerelda?
Esmerelda first appears in US birth records in 1971 — 54 years ago. The typical Esmerelda alive today was born around 2007, making them about 18 years old. About 800 people named Esmerelda are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Esmerelda most popular?
Esmerelda peaked in 2021, reaching #3801 nationally. Today it ranks #4987, 1,186 places below that high. See the whole 2021 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From smaragdos to Esmerelda
The story of Esmerelda
Gem names for daughters are ordinary in Spanish, alongside Perla and Diamantina, and Esmeralda is the most-used of them. A novel published in Paris in 1831, set around the cathedral of Notre-Dame, gave the name to a Roma dancer and made it known far outside Spanish-speaking countries; the many later versions of that story have kept it visible. It is widely given across Mexico and Central America and came to American records from there, with the middle vowel often rewritten as an e.
Meaning
emerald
Spanish esmeralda, an emerald, from Latin smaragdus and Greek smaragdos, which is itself a very old borrowing from a Semitic language. The gem and the word both traveled west along the same trade routes.
How the name formed
- smaragdos
- smaragdus
- esmeralda
- Esmerelda
Related forms: Esmeralda · Esmeralda · Smeralda · Esméralda
Pronouncing Esmerelda
ez-meh-RAL-dah
Four syllables, stress on the third. English speakers say ez-muh-RELL-duh, which is close enough that families rarely correct it.
Nicknames for Esmerelda
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
- 1971
- Most girls named
- 202139 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #3801reached in 2021
- Change vs 2024
- −23.5%26 in 2025, from 34
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.
Esmerelda in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Esmeralda in Spanish — spelling variant
- Esmeralda in Portuguese — same name
- Smeralda in Italian — same name
- Esméralda in French — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas.
Esmereldas among us
people named Esmerelda are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 61,818 born in 2025 was named Esmerelda
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Esmerelda
- #4987
- Esmerelda on the 2025 chart
- #928
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Esmerelda went to 26 girls in 2025, but Ezmerelda is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 32, which makes it the 928th most-given girls’ name of the year — 4,059 places above the chart.
- Esmerelda26
- Ezmerelda6
About 1 girl in 50,227 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 61,818 for Esmerelda 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 Marlies test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Esmerelda's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Marlies climbed just as high around 1963, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Marlies's path sketches the road Esmerelda is walking now.
Esmerelda 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 Esmerelda is headed
Esmerelda should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
Medium 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.
Esmerelda beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Esmerelda in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is a single gem that anyone can picture.
- Esme is a ready short form and a complete name in its own right.
- It works in Spanish, Portuguese, Italian and English households alike.
- Esmeralda is the standard Spanish spelling and this one will be corrected constantly.
- Four syllables is long for American forms and gets clipped without being asked.
- The name is strongly attached to one nineteenth-century novel and its many adaptations.
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What they receive
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Esmerelda
Feminine · #4987 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Esmereldas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 800 people named Esmerelda are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Esmerelda?
- Esmerelda is the most-used spelling in US records — 26 of the 32 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Ezmerelda.
- How popular is the name Esmerelda in 2025?
- Esmerelda ranks #4987 among US girl names in 2025, with 26 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Esmerelda?
- About 1 in every 61,818 US girls born in 2025 was named Esmerelda — 26 in all.
- Will my child share the name Esmerelda with classmates?
- Esmerelda will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Esmerelda
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Perri#4987 · Giannina#4987 · Karisma#4987 · Zuleyka#4987 · Mccall#4987 · Makinley#4987 · Jayani#4987 · Mela#4987
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Esmerelda? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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