Soraya
Feminine · “the Pleiades”
Arabic astronomers called the Pleiades — that little smudge of stars over the winter horizon — Thurayyā, and Persian took the word up as an everyday given name: Soraya. It is three open syllables with nothing sharp in them, and it is spelled the same in English, Spanish, French and Portuguese. Few names carry a piece of the night sky quite so directly.
How old is the name Soraya?
Soraya first appears in US birth records in 1955 — 70 years ago. The typical Soraya alive today was born around 2011, making them about 14 years old. About 6,700 people named Soraya are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Soraya most popular?
Soraya peaked in 2025, reaching #862 nationally. Today it ranks #862, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Soraya appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From Thurayyā to Soraya
The story of Soraya
The name begins as Arabic Thurayyā, the astronomers' word for the Pleiades, and passed into Persian as Soraya, where it has been a common woman's name for centuries. Turkish took the same word as Süreyya, and Malay and Indonesian as Suraya. Its route into western Europe is unusually easy to trace: Soraya Esfandiary-Bakhtiari became the second wife of the Shah of Iran in 1951, and through the 1950s she was one of the most photographed women in the European press, which is why Soraya took root in Spain, France, Portugal and the Netherlands and traveled from there into American records. So the name arrives in the United States by two roads at once — with Persian and Arabic-speaking families, and with Spanish and French speakers who met it in magazines.
Meaning
the Pleiades, the star cluster
Thurayyā is a diminutive form in Arabic, so the sense is closer to "the little cluster" than to a grand title. The same three-consonant root gives tharwa, "wealth, abundance", and older name dictionaries sometimes gloss Soraya that way as well.
How the name formed
- Thurayyā
- Soraya
- Süreyya
- Suraya
Related forms: Thurayyā · Sorayya · Süreyya · Soraya · Soraia · Suraya
Pronouncing Soraya
so-RYE-uh
That is the most common American reading. Persian, Arabic and Spanish speakers generally say so-rah-YAH or so-RAH-yah, with the final syllable fully sounded. Both are correct for the name; you will simply be choosing which one to teach.
Nicknames for Soraya
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
- 1955
- Most girls named
- 2025313 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #862reached in 2025
- Change vs 2024
- +7.2%313 in 2025, from 292
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.
Soraya in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Thurayyā in Arabic — transliteration
- Sorayya in Persian — spelling variant
- Süreyya in Turkish — same name
- Soraya in Spanish — same name
- Soraia in Portuguese — spelling variant
- Suraya in Malay/Indonesian — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Sorayas among us
people named Soraya are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 5,135 born in 2025 was named Soraya
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Soraya
- #862
- Soraya on the 2025 chart
- #622
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Soraya went to 313 girls in 2025, but Sorayah, Soraiya and Soraia are the same name said out loud. Together the 4 spellings went to 361, which makes it the 622nd most-given girls’ name of the year — 240 places above the chart.
- Soraya313
- Sorayah26
- Soraiya13
- Soraia9
About 1 girl in 4,452 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 5,135 for Soraya 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 Sheyla test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Soraya's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Sheyla climbed just as high around 2006, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Sheyla's path sketches the road Soraya is walking now.
Soraya is climbing fast right now. Steep climbs tend to come with steep descents — the quicker a name arrives, the more firmly it belongs to its moment.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Soraya is headed
Soraya should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
Medium confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Soraya beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Soraya in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Spelled identically in English, Spanish, French and Persian romanization, so the written form travels without adjustment.
- A documented history reaching back to Arabic astronomy, with continuous use as a given name in Persian and Turkish.
- Distinct enough that a child is very unlikely to share it with a classmate.
- Several short forms already in real use — Sori, Sora, Raya — rather than none at all.
- All-vowel endings and clear syllables make it easy for a small child to say and spell aloud.
- Two pronunciations compete: the English so-RYE-uh and the Persian, Arabic and Spanish so-rah-YAH. Both are legitimate, and your daughter will spend some of her life choosing which correction to bother with.
- Expect Soraia, Suraya, Sorayah and Soraiya as misspellings, since every one of those is a real form of the name somewhere.
- Rarity cuts both ways: the name will rarely be duplicated, but it will also rarely be recognized on sight, which means a lifetime of small introductions.
- In Iranian families the name is closely linked to Queen Soraya, whose marriage ended for lack of an heir — for some that history is poignant rather than unwelcome, but it is worth knowing it will be heard.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Soraya
Feminine · #862 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Sorayas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 6,700 people named Soraya are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Soraya?
- Soraya is the most-used spelling in US records — 313 of the 361 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Sorayah, Soraiya and Soraia.
- How popular is the name Soraya in 2025?
- Soraya ranks #862 among US girl names in 2025, with 313 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Soraya?
- About 1 in every 5,135 US girls born in 2025 was named Soraya — 313 in all.
- Will my child share the name Soraya with classmates?
- Soraya will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Soraya
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Eleanora#862 · Deborah#862 · Mercy#862 · Ayleen#862 · Arisbeth#862 · Jemma#862 · Haley#861 · Lilia#859
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Soraya? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Soraya and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Cast your vote
Which one would you pick?
Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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