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Malana

Feminine · “Hawaiian "buoyant”

1953high 2007
#6838 in the U.S.given to only a few children a year
rare16 girls in 2025

Malana is a name where half the story is genuine and half is American. Hawaiian mālana is a real word meaning buoyant or lightly floating, and it is used as a name in Hawaii. The mainland version that peaked in 2007 arrived by a different route: Ma- plus -lana, one of the most productive two-part shapes in modern American naming.

How old is the name Malana?

Malana first appears in US birth records in 1953 — 72 years ago. The typical Malana alive today was born around 2007, making them about 18 years old. About 1,200 people named Malana are estimated to be alive in the US today.

When was the name Malana most popular?

Malana peaked in 2007, reaching #2710 nationally. Today it ranks #6838, 4,128 places below that high. See the whole 2007 chart.

Compare this nameMore “M” names

Lists built from the same records:

I

Where it comes from

The story of Malana

Where the name is Hawaiian it belongs to a class of vocabulary names — words taken directly into use, still transparent to speakers, and stressed the way the word is stressed. Elsewhere it is built: Alana loses its first vowel and gains an M, or Lana takes a prefix, and the result is a name that looks like it has an etymology because it happens to match a real Hawaiian word. Both Malanas are in the same column of the American data, and nothing in the file distinguishes them.

Meaningscholars disagree

Hawaiian "buoyant, floating lightly" — for the Hawaiian name only

Mālana is documented Hawaiian with that sense, and Hawaiian families use it accordingly. But -lana is also a free-standing American name element (Lana, Alana, Elana, Milana, Solana) and Ma- is a free-standing prefix, so most mainland Malanas are compounds rather than Hawaiian borrowings. Treating every Malana as Hawaiian would be a guess about the family, not a fact about the name.

How the name formed

  1. mālana
  2. Malana

Related forms: Mālana · Alana · Milana

Pronouncing Malana

muh-LAH-nuh

Hawaiian would give a longer first vowel — MAA-lah-nah — with all three vowels fully pronounced. American English reduces the first and last vowels and puts the stress in the middle. The middle vowel is AH, not AY.

Nicknames for Malana

Moderate

LanaThe obvious clipping, and a well-established name on its own
MalCuts from the front instead
NanaA reduplicated toddler form built from the stressed syllable
II

What the data says

The long climb, and where it stands now

GIRLS NAMED · 1953–202567340671619532025

US babies named Malana per year from 1953 to 2025
AVERAGE RANK BY DECADE#1#10#100#1000#27101950s2020s

The same years in position rather than babies

First recorded
1953
Most girls named
200767 — the highest on record
Peak rank
#2710reached in 2007
Change vs 2024
−5.9%16 in 2025, from 17
Malana sits in the rare tail. Its best year on record was 2007, with 67 girls. Today it is given to few enough children that it does not enter the ranked charts at all.

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.

Malana in other languages

The same name elsewhere

  • Mālana in Hawaiian — same name
  • Alana in English — related form
  • Milana in Italian — related form

Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Ohio.

Malanas among us

1,200

people named Malana are estimated to be alive in the US today

About 1 girl in 100,454 born in 2025 was named Malana

Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method

III

Is it right for you

The Andrena test

Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Malana's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Andrena climbed just as high around 1968, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Andrena's path sketches the road Malana is walking now.

40%chance Malana will feel “very 2000s” by 2040
Malana, aligned on its peakAndrena· peak 1968not yet written
#1#10#100#1000peak-40 yrs+50 yrsAndrena · #14962Malana today
Malana today is about where Andrena stood in 1986 — 18 years past a #2708-sized peak. By 2001, Andrena had settled around #14322.
Ages quietlysteadyDates fast

Malana 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

Malana beside its neighbors

The names ranked closest to Malana in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.

Malanathis name16#6838Jeannie16#6838Maxie16#6838Nicol16#6838Chaney16#6838

US girls given each name in 2025.

The trade-off

Practical strengths
  • The rhythm matches Alana and Milana exactly, so it is instantly sayable without being one of them.
  • It shortens cleanly to Lana, a name with its own long history.
  • Every letter is pronounced; there is no silent element to explain.
What to consider
  • Claiming the Hawaiian meaning is only honest if the family has a Hawaiian connection — otherwise the match is coincidental.
  • Malana, Melana and Milana are all in use and will be confused with each other.
  • The first vowel is regularly written as an e by people hearing it for the first time.

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What they receive

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Malana

Feminine · #6838 in the U.S.

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Frequently asked

How many Malanas are there in the world?
No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,200 people named Malana are estimated to be alive in the US today.
How popular is the name Malana in 2025?
Malana ranks #6838 among US girl names in 2025, with 16 babies given the name.
How rare is the name Malana?
About 1 in every 100,454 US girls born in 2025 was named Malana — 16 in all.
Will my child share the name Malana with classmates?
Malana will almost certainly be the only one in school.

Ranked beside Malana

Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.

Jeannie#6838 · Maxie#6838 · Nicol#6838 · Chaney#6838 · Keana#6838 · Concetta#6838 · Camia#6838 · Pheobe#6838

Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Malana? See the current top 100.

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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology

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