Maricella
Feminine · “Maria joined to Celia or Marcela”
Maricella is one of the blends that Spanish-language naming produces constantly: Maria joined to a second element, run together, and treated as a single name. Marisela, Maricela, Maribel and Marisol all work the same way. Its American peak is 1971, with the growth of Mexican-American communities in the south-west.
How old is the name Maricella?
Maricella first appears in US birth records in 1949 — 76 years ago. The typical Maricella alive today was born around 1993, making them about 32 years old. About 1,700 people named Maricella are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Maricella most popular?
Maricella peaked in 1971, reaching #2296 nationally. Today it ranks #5917, 3,621 places below that high. See the whole 1971 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Miryam to Maricella
The story of Maricella
Spanish naming has two distinct ways of joining Maria to something else. The formal one is the Marian compound — Maria del Carmen, Maria Elena — where the second element is a title of the Virgin or a saint's name, and the two words stay separate. The informal one is the blend: Mari- plus a second element fused into one word, producing Maribel, Marisol, Marisela, Maricela and Maricella. Blends of this kind became very common in Mexico in the twentieth century and traveled north with migration. The doubled l in this spelling is an American refinement, aligning it visually with Isabella and Gabriella.
Meaningscholars disagree
Maria joined to Celia or Marcela
The Mari- front is Maria, from Hebrew Miryam, whose own meaning has never been settled. The second element is the question. It may be Celia, from the Roman family name Caelius, usually connected to caelum, 'heaven'; or Marcela, the feminine of Marcelo, from Mars; or simply a sound chosen to complete the name. Spanish blends of this kind are frequently made for their sound rather than assembled from two specific names, and the record cannot distinguish the cases.
How the name formed
- Miryam
- Maria
- Maricela
- Maricella
Related forms: Maricela · Marisela · Maribel
Pronouncing Maricella
mah-ree-SEH-lah
Four syllables, stress on the third, with a clean s for the c — Spanish c before e is soft. English speakers reading it cold produce mar-ih-SELL-uh, which is close enough to pass, though the vowels are reduced.
Nicknames for Maricella
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
- 1949
- Most girls named
- 199343 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2296reached in 1971
- Change vs 2024
- +66.7%20 in 2025, from 12
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.
Maricella in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Maricela in Spanish — spelling variant
- Marisela in Spanish — related form
- Maribel in Spanish — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California.
Maricellas among us
people named Maricella are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 80,363 born in 2025 was named Maricella
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Maricella
- #5917
- Maricella on the 2025 chart
- #844
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Maricella went to 20 girls in 2025, but Maricela, Marisela and Marisella are the same name said out loud. Together the 4 spellings went to 116, which makes it the 844th most-given girls’ name of the year — 5,073 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 13,856 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 80,363 for Maricella 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 Laquetta test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Maricella's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Laquetta climbed just as high around 1940, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Laquetta's path sketches the road Maricella is walking now.
Maricella 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
Maricella beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Maricella in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Mari and Chela are both established Spanish short forms.
- The spelling is fully phonetic in Spanish.
- It connects to one of the most widely borne names in the world.
- Maricela with one l is the standard Spanish spelling and hers will be written that way.
- Four syllables is long for everyday use, so a short form is effectively required.
- The second element cannot be identified with certainty, so the meaning needs a qualifier.
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What they receive
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Maricella
Feminine · #5917 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Maricellas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,700 people named Maricella are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Maricella?
- Maricella is one of 4 recorded spellings. Maricela is the more common one — 64 births in 2025 against 20 for Maricella.
- How popular is the name Maricella in 2025?
- Maricella ranks #5917 among US girl names in 2025, with 20 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Maricella?
- About 1 in every 80,363 US girls born in 2025 was named Maricella — 20 in all.
- Will my child share the name Maricella with classmates?
- Maricella will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Maricella
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Elda#5917 · Saloma#5917 · Fawn#5917 · Sarafina#5917 · Jaymie#5917 · Jania#5917 · Kimberlynn#5917 · Patsy#5917
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Maricella? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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