Tallulah
Feminine · “Contested”
Tallulah comes to us from a waterfall — a gorge in northeast Georgia where the Tallulah River drops in a series of cascades. The name traveled from that map to the American South as a family name, and the mouth enjoys it: three syllables that roll forward and land softly, with Lulu and Tally already waiting inside it.
How old is the name Tallulah?
Tallulah first appears in US birth records in 1917 — 108 years ago. The typical Tallulah is a kid of about 7 — this name's wave is very recent. About 4,000 people named Tallulah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Tallulah most popular?
Tallulah peaked in 2023, reaching #810 nationally. Today it ranks #939, 129 places below that high. See the whole 2023 chart.
Tallulah appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
Origin, sound and short forms
The story of Tallulah
The Tallulah River and its gorge in northeast Georgia gave the name its American life, and by the nineteenth century it was being used as a given name by Southern families. The best-known bearer, the actress Tallulah Bankhead, was named for her grandmother — proof that the name was already a family inheritance before it was a stage marquee. On a separate track entirely, Irish records preserve Tuilelaith, borne by early medieval women and later anglicized as Talulla and Tallulah, so the spelling has two independent ancestries that happen to meet. In the United States it has never left the registers, and its recent climb is strongest in Georgia and along the coasts.
Meaningscholars disagree
Contested — either "leaping water" or an Irish name built on "abundance" and "sovereignty"
Two serious readings stand behind the same spelling. The American name is a Georgia place name, usually glossed as Choctaw "talula," leaping or tumbling water; that gloss is widely repeated, though the falls sat in Cherokee territory and the Cherokee original has no settled translation. Separately, Irish onomastics records the early name Tuilelaith, from elements meaning flood or abundance and princess or sovereignty, anglicized as Talulla and Tallulah. Both roads are real; neither cancels the other.
Pronouncing Tallulah
tuh-LOO-luh
Stress on the middle syllable. The final -ah is a plain unstressed "uh," not drawn out.
Nicknames for Tallulah
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
- 1917
- Most girls named
- 2023345 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #810reached in 2023
- Change vs 2024
- −19.1%276 in 2025, from 341
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.
Tallulah in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Talulla in Irish — related form
- Tuilelaith in Irish (Old) — related form
- Tallula in English — spelling variant
- Talulah in English — spelling variant
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Georgia, Florida.
Tallulahs among us
people named Tallulah are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 5,823 born in 2025 was named Tallulah
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Tallulah
- #939
- Tallulah on the 2025 chart
- #623
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Tallulah went to 276 girls in 2025, but Talulah, Talula and Tallula and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 6 spellings went to 359, which makes it the 623rd most-given girls’ name of the year — 316 places above the chart.
- Tallulah276
- Talulah38
- Talula19
- Tallula10
- Talullah10
- Talulla6
About 1 girl in 4,477 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 5,823 for Tallulah 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 Kasie test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Tallulah's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Kasie climbed just as high around 1987, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Kasie's path sketches the road Tallulah is walking now.
Tallulah 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 Tallulah is headed
Tallulah looks set to keep climbing gently, with roughly 26% more babies a year by 2030 if the current curve holds.
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.
Tallulah beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Tallulah in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Comes with ready-made short forms — Lulu, Tally, Lula — each already in real use, so a child has options without anyone inventing one.
- A documented place name and a documented Irish name, giving it roots in two traditions rather than none.
- Long present in American records, so its recent rise is a revival rather than a coinage.
- Phonetically transparent: most English speakers read it correctly on the first try.
- The spelling gets tested constantly. Tallula, Talulah and Tallulla all circulate, and the doubled L plus the silent-looking final H means she will likely spell it aloud for life.
- Rare enough that she will almost certainly be the only one wherever she goes — freeing for some children, tiring for others who would rather not explain a name.
- The meaning is unsettled, so there is no single tidy line to offer relatives who ask what it means. What you can say is where it comes from: a waterfall in Georgia, and an old Irish name.
- Lulu tends to take over early. If you dislike it, be aware it arrives on its own.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Tallulah to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Tallulah
Feminine · #939 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Tallulahs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 4,000 people named Tallulah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Tallulah?
- Tallulah is the most-used spelling in US records — 276 of the 359 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Talulah, Talula, Tallula, Talullah and Talulla.
- How popular is the name Tallulah in 2025?
- Tallulah ranks #939 among US girl names in 2025, with 276 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Tallulah?
- About 1 in every 5,823 US girls born in 2025 was named Tallulah — 276 in all.
- Will my child share the name Tallulah with classmates?
- Tallulah will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Tallulah
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Ayra#939 · Alianna#938 · Elara#941 · Darla#941 · Kimber#936 · Salma#936 · Zaria#943 · Mariella#943
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Tallulah? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Tallulah and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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