Ella
A feminine name of Germanic origin meaning "all", "completely" or "fairy maiden".
Roughly 214,512 people in the United States go by the first name Ella, which ranks #30 nationally when sorted by estimated living bearers. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Ella today is around 21 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Ella births was 2010 (9,897 babies). In terms of living bearers, it sits close to Billy (213,640).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Ella. 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 Ella with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Ella is used almost entirely for girls, the SSA data does show 901 boys registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
215K
~ 1 in 1,598 Americans
Peak year
2010
9,897 babies that year
Average age
21
years old
2023 SSA rank
#30
Tracked since 1880
Census
Ella in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 185,531 people with the first name Ella, which placed it at #299 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
#299
National first-name rank
People counted
186K
185,531 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
61.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
75.6% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Ella
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ella is White at 75.6%. The next largest groups are Black (8.5%) and Hispanic (6.9%). 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 Ella 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 Ella at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White75.6% · 140,224
- Black or African American8.5% · 15,772
- Hispanic or Latino6.9% · 12,806
- Two or more races5.2% · 9,740
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.1% · 5,784
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.6% · 1,205
Gender
Gender distribution for Ella
Out of the 346,302 babies given the name Ella since 1880, 99.7% 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.
Ella as a male name
- Ranked #12,768 in 2023
- 5 male births in 2023
- Peak: 2004 (27 births)
Ella as a female name
- Ranked #30 in 2024
- 5,685 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2010 (9,883 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ella appears almost entirely female. Of the 185,535 people counted with this name, 99.8% were female and only a very small share were male.
Popularity
Ella: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Ella 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 85,983 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Ella remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Ella 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 Ella during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Ellas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 51 states and territories. California, Texas, New York recorded the most babies named Ella, while Wyoming, Alaska, Vermont recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 5,814 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Ella
The name Ella is a shortened form of the Germanic name Eleanor, which means "shining light" or "bright one." It is derived from the Old Provençal phrase "Alia Elionor," which translates to "the other Aenor." The name Eleanor itself is a combination of the Germanic elements "ali" meaning "other" and "nora" meaning "honor."
Ella became popular as a independent name in the 19th century, particularly in English-speaking countries like the United States and Britain. It was used as a diminutive for Eleanor, but also gained popularity as a stand-alone name. The shorter form Ella was seen as more modern and fashionable than the more traditional Eleanor.
One of the earliest recorded uses of the name Ella dates back to the 9th century, when an Anglo-Saxon princess named Ella lived in England. She was the daughter of King Aethelred I of Wessex and was known for her piety and charitable works.
In the 12th century, the name Ella appeared in the French epic poem "The Song of Roland," where it was the name of a character who was the wife of one of Charlemagne's knights. This literary reference helped to popularize the name in Europe during the Middle Ages.
Throughout history, several notable women have borne the name Ella. These include Ella Fitzgerald (1917-1996), the famous American jazz singer known as the "First Lady of Song," and Ella Baker (1903-1986), an influential African-American civil rights activist who worked alongside Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and other leaders of the civil rights movement.
Other famous Ellas include Ella Reeve Bloor (1862-1951), an American labor organizer and socialist activist; Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919), a popular American poet and writer; and Ella Grase (1889-1916), a Latvian writer and feminist who played a significant role in the Latvian National Awakening movement.
While the name Ella has experienced periods of greater and lesser popularity over the centuries, it has remained a beloved choice for parents in many parts of the world, particularly in English-speaking countries, where its Germanic roots and association with light and honor have endured.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Ella
People
Ella + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Ella as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with E
Other first names starting with E with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Ella: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Ella?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 214,512 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Ella 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 1,598 US residents.
Is Ella a common name?
We classify Ella as "Common". It ranks above 99.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 346,302 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Ella most popular?
The single biggest year for Ella was 2010, when 9,897 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Ella is about 21 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Ella in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 185,531 people with the name Ella, or 61.43 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #299 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 Ella 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 Ella?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Ella appears almost entirely female. Of the 185,535 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 Ella?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Ella is White at 75.6%. The next largest groups are Black (8.5%) and Hispanic (6.9%). 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 Ella most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Ella in the 2020 Census, accounting for 75.6% (140,224 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 Ella in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Ella a female name?
Yes, 99.7% of people registered as Ella 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 Ella still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Ella 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 Ella 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 named Ella?
HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, answers that with the living-bearer count in one glance.