Sharika
Feminine
Sharika is an American name that happens to coincide with a goddess. There is a hill above Srinagar in Kashmir with a shrine on it, and the deity of that hill is called Sharika; the coincidence is real and the connection is not. Saying both things at once is the only honest way to handle a name like this.
How old is the name Sharika?
Sharika first appears in US birth records in 1973 — 52 years ago. The typical Sharika alive today was born around 1986, making them about 39 years old. About 1,300 people named Sharika are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Sharika most popular?
Sharika peaked in 1987, reaching #1519 nationally. See the whole 1987 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
Our story of Sharika
The ending is the traceable half. Latin made adjectives with -icus and -ica, and a great many of those adjectives became names: Monica, Veronica, Dominica, and by a different route Erica, which is the Latin word for heather. Once enough of them were in circulation English stopped analyzing the ending and started using it, so that -ika and -ica became available to attach to anything at all. That is what happened here. The front syllable belongs to the most productive opening in twentieth-century American naming, the ending belongs to Latin by way of four or five inherited names, and the join between them was made by ear. Meanwhile, and entirely separately, a hill above the old city of Srinagar has been a place of pilgrimage for centuries, and the goddess who lives on it is called Sharika. Nothing connects the two, and the resemblance is worth knowing about precisely so that it is not mistaken for a source.
Meaningnot established
Not established
The American name has no traceable source. Its ending belongs to a group of names that came into English through Latin, where -ica was an adjective suffix meaning belonging to or characteristic of, and which English eventually stopped hearing as a suffix at all. The opening is from American naming and not from Latin. Glosses that assign the whole name to Sanskrit, Arabic or Swahili are working from the resemblance and not from any record of use.
Pronouncing Sharika
shuh-REE-kuh
Three syllables with the stress in the middle. Some families say shuh-RIK-uh with a short vowel, and the spelling gives no help. The first syllable is reduced almost to nothing, which is why it can be written sha, she or shu without any change in sound.
Nicknames for Sharika
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
- 1973
- Most girls named
- 198784 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1519reached in 1987
- Change vs 2013
- −28.6%5 in 2019, from 7
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.
Sharikas among us
people named Sharika are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Sharika sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- The rhythm is the settled American one, so the name sounds established rather than experimental.
- Shari and Rika are two short forms in completely different registers, one plain and one striking.
- Every sound in it is ordinary English and it is never mispronounced once it has been heard.
- The stressed vowel has two live readings and the spelling settles neither, so the name must be introduced.
- Several spellings of the same sound circulate, which means spelling it out on every form.
- There is no meaning to give a child who asks, and the resemblance to a real name elsewhere invites a wrong answer.
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Sharika
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Sharikas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,300 people named Sharika are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Sharika in 2025?
- Sharika is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Sharika with classmates?
- Sharika will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More S names
The most-given names starting with S, all years combined.
Susan#1085 · Sarah#90 · Sandra#1207 · Stephanie#557 · Sharon#1250 · Shirley#1581 · Samantha#151 · Sophia#5
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Sharika? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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