Ariana
A feminine name of Italian origin meaning "most holy one".
Name Census estimates that about 116,412 living Americans carry the first name Ariana. It sits at #103 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Ariana today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ariana births was 2014 (5,512 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ariana. 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 Ariana with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Ariana is used almost entirely for girls, the SSA data does show 200 boys registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
116K
~ 1 in 2,944 Americans
Peak year
2014
5,512 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2022 SSA rank
#103
Tracked since 1957
Census
Ariana in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 95,572 people with the first name Ariana, which placed it at #567 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
#567
National first-name rank
People counted
96K
95,572 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
31.6
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
54.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ariana
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ariana is Hispanic at 54.1%. The next largest groups are White (26.5%) and Black (10.1%). 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 Ariana 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 Ariana at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino54.1% · 51,686
- White26.5% · 25,282
- Black or African American10.1% · 9,669
- Two or more races5.6% · 5,381
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.1% · 2,967
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.6% · 587
Gender
Gender distribution for Ariana
Out of the 118,325 babies given the name Ariana since 1880, 99.8% were registered as female. The name sits firmly on the female side of the spectrum, with only a handful of male registrations across the entire dataset.
Ariana as a male name
- Ranked #8,356 in 2022
- 9 male births in 2022
- Peak: 1989 (18 births)
Ariana as a female name
- Ranked #103 in 2024
- 2,569 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2014 (5,502 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ariana appears almost entirely female. Of the 95,572 people counted with this name, 99.8% were female and only a very small share were male.
Popularity
Ariana: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ariana from the 1950s through to the 2020s, spanning 8 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 41,363 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Ariana remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ariana 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 Ariana during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Arianas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Ariana, while Wyoming, Vermont, North Dakota recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 2,289 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Ariana
The name Ariana has its roots in the ancient Persian language and culture. It is derived from the word "Ariana," which was the name used to refer to the vast region that encompassed parts of modern-day Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan. This region was known as the "Land of the Arians," with the term "Aryan" referring to the Indo-Iranian people who inhabited the area.
Ariana is believed to have been in use as a feminine name since ancient times, although its earliest documented appearance is uncertain. One of the earliest known references to the name can be found in the Avesta, the sacred texts of Zoroastrianism, which date back to around the 6th century BCE.
In the medieval era, the name Ariana gained popularity among Persian nobility and was borne by several notable figures. One such figure was Ariana of Panjikent, a princess from the Sogdian city of Panjikent (located in modern-day Tajikistan) who lived in the 8th century CE. She was renowned for her beauty and intelligence and was celebrated in Persian poetry and literature.
Another notable bearer of the name was Ariana of Amsterdam, a 17th-century Dutch artist and poet who was admired for her talent and intellect. She was born in Amsterdam in 1628 and gained recognition for her portraits and still-life paintings.
In the 19th century, the name Ariana was popularized in Europe, particularly in Italy and France. One of the most famous figures with this name was Ariana Nozadze, a Georgian princess and writer who lived from 1828 to 1892. She was known for her contributions to Georgian literature and her advocacy for women's rights.
Another notable bearer of the name was Ariana Mavroleon, a Greek-American archaeologist and scholar who lived from 1895 to 1973. She was instrumental in the excavation and preservation of ancient sites in Greece and made significant contributions to the field of classical archaeology.
In more recent times, the name Ariana has gained widespread popularity, particularly in the United States and other Western countries. Some famous modern bearers of the name include Ariana Grande, the American singer and actress born in 1993, and Ariana Madix, an American reality television personality born in 1985.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Ariana
People
Ariana + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ariana 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
Ariana: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ariana?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 116,412 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ariana 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 2,944 US residents.
Is Ariana a common name?
We classify Ariana as "Common". It ranks above 99.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 118,325 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ariana most popular?
The single biggest year for Ariana was 2014, when 5,512 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ariana is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ariana in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 95,572 people with the name Ariana, or 31.64 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #567 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 Ariana 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 Ariana?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ariana appears almost entirely female. Of the 95,572 people counted with this name, 99.8% 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 Ariana?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ariana is Hispanic at 54.1%. The next largest groups are White (26.5%) and Black (10.1%). 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 Ariana most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Ariana in the 2020 Census, accounting for 54.1% (51,686 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 Ariana in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ariana a female name?
Yes, 99.8% of people registered as Ariana 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 Ariana still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ariana 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 Ariana 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 people are called Ariana?
For a faster, more casual read, check HowManyOfMe.org — our sister site built around that single question.