Mikaila
Feminine · “who is like God”
Michaela is a name English readers cannot get right on sight. The ch is a k, inherited from Greek; the ae is two vowels that most people run together; and the result is said four different ways in four households. Mikaila rebuilds the whole thing out of letters that only make one sound each — which is exactly what a phonetic respelling is for.
How old is the name Mikaila?
Mikaila first appears in US birth records in 1984 — 41 years ago. The typical Mikaila alive today was born around 2001, making them about 24 years old. About 2,400 people named Mikaila are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mikaila most popular?
Mikaila peaked in 2001, reaching #928 nationally. Today it ranks #13208, 12,280 places below that high. See the whole 2001 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Mikha'el to Mikaila
The story of Mikaila
Michaela is the Latin feminine of Michael and has been used across Europe for a long time — Micaela in Spanish, Michela in Italian, Michaela in German and Czech. It reached wide American use in the 1980s and 1990s, at which point the spelling problem became acute: a name that could be read as mih-KAY-luh, mih-KYE-luh or mih-SHAY-luh needs help. The respellings solved it by brute force, replacing ch with k and ae with ai, and Mikaila is one of the tidier results.
Meaning
who is like God
From the Hebrew Mikha'el, in its Latin feminine form. It is a question rather than a claim — who is like God — asked with the answer taken as obvious. The ch in every European spelling is the Greek letter chi, used to transliterate the Hebrew, and it has been said as a plain k in English for centuries.
How the name formed
- Mikha'el
- Michaela
- Mikaila
Related forms: Micaela · Michela · Michaela · Micheála
Pronouncing Mikaila
mih-KAY-luh
Three syllables, stress in the middle. The k and the ai between them remove every ambiguity the standard spelling carries, which is the whole argument for this version.
Nicknames for Mikaila
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
- 1984
- Most girls named
- 2001239 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #928reached in 2001
- Change vs 2023
- −53.8%6 in 2025, from 13
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.
Mikaila in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Micaela in Spanish — same name
- Michela in Italian — same name
- Michaela in Czech — same name
- Micheála in Irish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California.
Mikailas among us
people named Mikaila are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 267,878 born in 2025 was named Mikaila
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Mikaila
- #13208
- Mikaila on the 2025 chart
- #590
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Mikaila went to 6 girls in 2025, but Mikayla, Mykayla and Mickayla and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 6 spellings went to 400, which makes it the 590th most-given girls’ name of the year — 12,618 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 4,018 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 267,878 for Mikaila 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 Corrina test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Mikaila's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Corrina climbed just as high around 1974, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Corrina's path sketches the road Mikaila is walking now.
Mikaila 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
Mikaila beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Mikaila in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It removes the pronunciation problem that the standard spelling creates.
- Three short forms are available and they are entirely unalike.
- The name behind it is recognized in Judaism, Christianity and Islam alike.
- Every letter in it makes one sound and only one.
- Michaela, Mikayla, Makayla and Mikaela all compete, so the spelling is a permanent footnote.
- The respelling erases the Greek and Latin history from the page.
- The name family was very heavily used in one stretch of decades and dates a woman accordingly.
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What they receive
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Mikaila
Feminine · #13208 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Mikailas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 2,400 people named Mikaila are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Mikaila?
- Mikaila is one of 6 recorded spellings. Mikayla is the more common one — 364 births in 2025 against 6 for Mikaila.
- How popular is the name Mikaila in 2025?
- Mikaila ranks #13208 among US girl names in 2025, with 6 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Mikaila?
- About 1 in every 267,878 US girls born in 2025 was named Mikaila — 6 in all.
- Will my child share the name Mikaila with classmates?
- Mikaila will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Mikaila
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
John#13208 · Vinnie#13208 · Margery#13208 · Jossie#13208 · Tressa#13208 · Erie#13208 · Bernadine#13208 · Euna#13208
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mikaila? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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