Adela
A feminine name of German origin meaning "noble" or "nobility".
Name Census estimates that about 8,869 living Americans carry the first name Adela. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Adela today is around 35 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Adela births was 2015 (227 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Adela. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Adela with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
8.9K
~ 1 in 38,646 Americans
Peak year
2015
227 babies that year
Average age
35
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,095
Tracked since 1880
Census
Adela in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 21,730 people with the first name Adela, which placed it at #1,521 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#1,521
National first-name rank
People counted
22K
21,730 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
7.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
83.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Adela
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Adela is Hispanic at 83.0%. The next largest groups are White (10.8%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (4.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Adela described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Adela at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino83.0% · 18,026
- White10.8% · 2,355
- Asian and Pacific Islander4.4% · 955
- Black or African American0.9% · 196
- Two or more races0.7% · 161
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.2% · 37
Popularity
Adela: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Adela from the 1880s through to the 2020s, spanning 15 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 1,877 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Adela remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Adela by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Adela during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Adelas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 29 states and territories. Texas, California, New York recorded the most babies named Adela, while Oregon, Nevada, Nebraska recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 327 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Adela
The name Adela is a feminine given name of Germanic origin, derived from the Old German words "adal" meaning "noble" and "hildy" meaning "battle." It first emerged in the medieval period, around the 8th century, and was commonly used among the nobility and ruling classes of various Germanic tribes and kingdoms.
The earliest recorded use of the name Adela can be traced back to the 9th century, when it was borne by Adela of Pfalzel, a Frankish noblewoman and the daughter of King Louis the German. Another notable bearer of the name was Adela of Blois (1067-1137), a Countess of Blois and one of the most powerful and influential women of her time in medieval France.
In the 12th century, the name gained popularity in England, where it was often spelled as "Adelina" or "Alina." One of the most famous bearers of the name from this period was Adela of Normandy (1067-1137), the daughter of William the Conqueror and the wife of Stephen, King of England.
The name Adela also appeared in various literary works and historical records throughout the Middle Ages, such as the Nibelungenlied, an epic poem from medieval German literature, where it was the name of one of the main characters.
Other notable historical figures named Adela include:
1. Adela of Hamaland (c. 875-923), a Frankish noblewoman and the mother of Emperor Otto I of Germany.
2. Adela of Lotharingia (c. 950-1015), a German noblewoman and the wife of King Hugh Capet of France.
3. Adela of Meissen (1160-1211), a German noblewoman and the wife of King Ottokar I of Bohemia.
4. Adela of Normandy (1067-1137), the daughter of William the Conqueror and the wife of Stephen, King of England.
5. Adela of Burgundy (c. 1103-1162), the daughter of Duke Odo I of Burgundy and the wife of King Louis VI of France.
While the name Adela fell out of widespread use in many parts of Europe after the Middle Ages, it continued to be used in some regions, particularly in Germany and parts of Eastern Europe, where it evolved into various regional spellings and forms, such as "Adela" in Polish and "Adéla" in Czech.
People
Adela + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Adela as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Adela: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Adela?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 8,869 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Adela going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 38,646 US residents.
Is Adela a common name?
We classify Adela as "Rare". It ranks above 97.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 13,902 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Adela most popular?
The single biggest year for Adela was 2015, when 227 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Adela is about 35 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Adela in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 21,730 people with the name Adela, or 7.19 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,521 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Adela in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Adela?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Adela appears almost entirely female. Of the 21,729 people counted with this name, 99.7% were female and only a very small share were male. The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Adela?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Adela is Hispanic at 83.0%. The next largest groups are White (10.8%) and Asian/Pacific Islander (4.4%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Adela most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Adela in the 2020 Census, accounting for 83.0% (18,026 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Adela in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Adela a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Adela in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Adela still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Adela in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Adela can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How many Americans are named Adela?
See how many Americans are named Adela on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.