Keela
Feminine · “comely”
Keela is what Irish spelling looks like after English has had it. The Irish names behind it — Cadhla and Caoilfhionn among them — contain letter groups that are silent in Irish and simply vanish when the name is written for English readers. What is left is four letters and two syllables, which is a great deal less than what went in.
How old is the name Keela?
Keela first appears in US birth records in 1956 — 69 years ago. The typical Keela alive today was born around 1985, making them about 40 years old. About 1,000 people named Keela are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Keela most popular?
Keela peaked in 1974, reaching #2396 nationally. Today it ranks #14942, 12,546 places below that high. See the whole 1974 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Cadhla to Keela
The story of Keela
Irish orthography records sounds that no longer exist and marks consonants that have gone silent, which is why an Irish name on paper is so much longer than the same name in the mouth. The dh in Cadhla and the fh in Caoilfhionn are both silent, and when these names crossed into English the silent letters were not translated — they were dropped, because English has no way to write a letter that does nothing. Keela is the residue of that process. It is not a corruption so much as a transcription, and it is closer to how the name is actually said than the Irish spelling is.
Meaningscholars disagree
comely; graceful
Cadhla is an old Irish name usually read as comely or beautiful, and it is the likeliest source. A second candidate is Caoilfhionn, slender and fair, which anglicizes to Keelin and could shed its ending. A third is that the name was simply built in America on the sound of Keeley and Keegan. All three are plausible and none is documented for any particular family, so the meaning is available rather than settled.
How the name formed
- Cadhla
- Keela
Related forms: Cadhla · Caoilfhionn · Caoilainn
Pronouncing Keela
KEE-luh
KEE-luh, two syllables, stress at the front. The Irish originals are said differently — Cadhla is closer to KY-luh, with the first vowel like the word eye — so the English spelling has fixed a pronunciation that the Irish one does not give.
Nicknames for Keela
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
- 1956
- Most girls named
- 197833 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2396reached in 1974
- Change vs 2023
- 0.0%5 in 2025, from 5
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.
Keela in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Cadhla in Irish — related form
- Caoilfhionn in Irish — related form
- Caoilainn in Irish — related form
Keelas among us
people named Keela are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 321,453 born in 2025 was named Keela
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 Keiko test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Keela's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Keiko climbed just as high around 1941, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Keiko's path sketches the road Keela is walking now.
Keela 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
Keela beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Keela in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Four letters, two syllables, and no ambiguity at all about how to say it.
- It gestures at a real Irish name family with real meanings behind it rather than at nothing.
- Nothing in the spelling is silent, which is a considerable improvement on the originals.
- Keila, Kayla and Keeley are all close in sound and much more common, so the name gets substituted often.
- Anyone who reads Irish will see the anglicization rather than the name, and may say the original instead.
- The connection to any one Irish source is genuinely uncertain, so the meaning offered will always come with a hedge.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Keela
Feminine · #14942 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Keelas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Keela are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Keela in 2025?
- Keela ranks #14942 among US girl names in 2025, with 5 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Keela?
- About 1 in every 321,453 US girls born in 2025 was named Keela — 5 in all.
- Will my child share the name Keela with classmates?
- Keela will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Keela
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Sophya#14942 · Lyllian#14942 · Sarrah#14942 · Mellanie#14942 · Kally#14942 · Dyanna#14942 · Morgann#14942 · Sabryna#14942
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Keela? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Keela and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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