Shaela
Feminine · “Latin Caecilius”
Behind Shaela, at some distance, is Sheila, the Irish form of Cecilia. That name did something very few given names manage: in Australia it stopped being a name and became an ordinary word for a woman.
How old is the name Shaela?
Shaela first appears in US birth records in 1967 — 58 years ago. The typical Shaela alive today was born around 1999, making them about 26 years old. About 1,100 people named Shaela are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Shaela most popular?
Shaela peaked in 1997, reaching #2733 nationally. Today it ranks #10107, 7,374 places below that high. See the whole 1997 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Caecilia to Shaela
Our story of Shaela
A given name becoming a common noun is rare and usually unkind to the name. Sheila did it in Australia, where by the nineteenth century it meant simply a woman, in the same way that a jack could mean a laborer or a sailor. Once that happens the name cannot easily be given, because it is being used every day for something else. Sheila stayed usable in Ireland, America and Britain but never fully recovered its ordinary footing in Australia, and its American descendants moved away from the spelling entirely. Shayla, Shaela and Shaila keep the sound and abandon the letters, which detaches them from the Irish name and from the Australian noun at once. That is often what a respelling is for: not decoration, but distance from something the old spelling carries.
Meaningscholars disagree
Latin Caecilius, from caecus, blind
Shaela is a modern American respelling in the Shayla and Sheila family. Sheila is the English spelling of Irish Sile, the Irish form of Cecilia, from the Roman family name Caecilius, related to caecus, blind. Whether Shaela derives from that name or was assembled from the Sha- prefix and an -ela ending cannot be determined. The peak is 1997.
How the name formed
- Caecilia
- Sile
- Sheila
- Shaela
Related forms: Sile · Shayla · Sheila
Pronouncing Shaela
SHAY-luh
Two syllables, stress on the first. Some families say shah-EL-uh with three, which the spelling also permits; there is no settled reading.
Nicknames for Shaela
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
- 1967
- Most girls named
- 200047 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2733reached in 1997
- Change vs 2023
- +80.0%9 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.
Shaela in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Sile in Irish — related form
- Shayla in English — spelling variant
- Sheila in English — related form
Shaelas among us
people named Shaela are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 178,585 born in 2025 was named Shaela
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 Rosalin test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Shaela's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Rosalin climbed just as high around 1923, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Rosalin's path sketches the road Shaela is walking now.
Shaela 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
Shaela beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Shaela in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Shae and Shay are ready short forms and both are current names.
- The sound is soft and open with no hard consonants.
- It is much rarer than Shayla while sounding the same.
- Two pronunciations are possible from this spelling.
- Shayla is the standard form and will be written by default.
- No documented meaning attaches to this spelling specifically.
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What they receive
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Shaela
Feminine · #10107 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Shaelas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,100 people named Shaela are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Shaela in 2025?
- Shaela ranks #10107 among US girl names in 2025, with 9 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Shaela?
- About 1 in every 178,585 US girls born in 2025 was named Shaela — 9 in all.
- Will my child share the name Shaela with classmates?
- Shaela will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Shaela
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Berta#10107 · Jettie#10107 · Maye#10107 · Osa#10107 · Fidelia#10107 · Alysa#10107 · Su#10107 · Willie#10107
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Shaela? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Shaela and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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