Estella
Feminine · Latin roots · “star”
Estella is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 42,920 girls against 55 boys since 1880.
Estella is the Latin word for star, barely disguised — stella, wearing an extra syllable at the front the way medieval French liked to dress it. It has been said aloud in English since the nineteenth century, and it sits comfortably in Spanish too, which is part of why it turns up most in California, Texas and Florida.
How old is the name Estella?
Estella was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Estella alive today was born around 1933, making them about 92 years old. About 18,500 people named Estella are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Estella most popular?
Estella peaked in 1883, reaching #106 nationally. Today it ranks #509, 403 places below that high. See the whole 1883 chart.
Where it comes from
From stella (Latin) to Estella
The story of Estella
The root is the Latin stella, star, which became the medieval French given name Estelle and survived in the south of France long after Latin stopped being spoken. Estella is the Latinate form of that name, and English speakers took it up in the nineteenth century, when classical and flower-and-star names were being pulled back into use together. Dickens gave the name to the cool, unreachable ward of Miss Havisham in Great Expectations in 1861, which fixed the spelling in the English-reading imagination. There is also a town called Estella in Navarre, in northern Spain, which keeps the same shape alive in a different register entirely.
Meaning
star
From Latin stella, 'star', through the Old French given name Estelle.
How the name formed
- stellaLatin
- EstelleOld French
- Estella
Related forms: Estela · Estelle · Stella · Estela · Stella · Estel
Pronouncing Estella
eh-STEL-ah
Stress on the middle syllable in both English and Spanish. Spanish speakers may soften the first vowel toward 'es-TEH-la'.
Nicknames for Estella
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
- 1880
- Most girls named
- 1921638 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #106reached in 1883
- Change vs 2022
- −8.2%581 in 2025, from 633
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.
Estella in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Estela in Spanish — spelling variant
- Estelle in French — related form
- Stella in Italian — related form
- Estela in Portuguese — spelling variant
- Stella in English — related form
- Estel in Catalan — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida.
Estellas among us
people named Estella are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 2,766 born in 2025 was named Estella
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Estella
- #509
- Estella on the 2025 chart
- #409
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Estella went to 581 girls in 2025, but Estela is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 709, which makes it the 409th most-given girls’ name of the year — 100 places above the chart.
- Estella581
- Estela128
About 1 girl in 2,267 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 2,766 for Estella 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
Fashion outlook
Estella is on its second act. Revived names age gently: the generation that wore them first is far enough away that the name feels classic rather than dated.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Estella is headed
Estella looks set to keep climbing gently, with roughly 19% more babies a year by 2030 if the current curve holds.
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.
Estella beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Estella in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Meaning is transparent and easy to explain: star, from Latin stella.
- Several short forms already in wide use — Stella, Ella, Essie — none of which need explaining.
- Reads and pronounces naturally in English, Spanish and Portuguese, with close relatives in French and Italian.
- Documented as a given name in English since the nineteenth century, and represented in every generation since.
- It sits in a crowd of near-identical names: Estelle, Estela, Stella. Expect to spell it out often, and to be handed the wrong one on paperwork now and then.
- Stella is far more familiar to most ears, so an Estella may find herself shortened to Stella by teachers and coaches unless you correct it early.
- Dickens's Estella in Great Expectations is deliberately cold and made to break hearts. Some readers make the connection immediately; most do not.
- It is still strongly represented among older generations, which for some listeners places it firmly in the past — though it has been climbing back for a while now.
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Estella
Feminine · Latin roots · #509 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Estellas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 18,500 people named Estella are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Estella?
- Estella is the most-used spelling in US records — 581 of the 709 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Estela.
- How popular is the name Estella in 2025?
- Estella ranks #509 among US girl names in 2025, with 581 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Estella?
- About 1 in every 2,766 US girls born in 2025 was named Estella — 581 in all.
- Will my child share the name Estella with classmates?
- Estella will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Estella
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Scarlet#509 · Beatrice#508 · Remington#511 · Yara#507 · Hanna#511 · Alisson#511 · Raegan#505 · Mariam#505
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Estella? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Estella and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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