girl's name
Lela
LEE-luh
- Origin Arabic
- Gender Girl
- Syllables 2
- Letters 4
- Popularity Uncommon
- Births on record 43,412
Scotland
#663
2010 births
Lela means night on the Arabic reading, and that connects it to one of the oldest love stories in the world — Layla and Majnun, retold in Persian verse eight centuries ago. It also serves in English as a short form of Adelaide or Delia.
- Lela is a name of Arabic origin.
- Peaked in 1921, when 907 babies were given the name.
- Its usage has held steady over the past decade.
- Today about 1 in 43,624 babies in the United States is given this name.
- 2 syllables, with the stress on syllable 1.
Lela over time
Births per decade in the United States, 1880s to 2020s. The striped bar is the 2020s, still in progress — it covers 2020 to 2025, not a full ten years.
Show the numbers
| Decade | Births |
|---|---|
| 1880s | 1,920 |
| 1890s | 3,892 |
| 1900s | 4,473 |
| 1910s | 7,019 |
| 1920s | 7,869 |
| 1930s | 4,641 |
| 1940s | 3,362 |
| 1950s | 2,382 |
| 1960s | 1,478 |
| 1970s | 1,068 |
| 1980s | 864 |
| 1990s | 687 |
| 2000s | 1,380 |
| 2010s | 1,467 |
| 2020s (to 2025) | 571 |
What Lela means
Lela means night from the Arabic layl, or serves as a short form of Adelaide and Delia. The two accounts are unrelated and the spelling does not distinguish them.
Where Lela comes from
Lela is a variant of Leila or Layla, from the Arabic layl, night — the name in Layla and Majnun, the seventh-century Arabic story retold in Persian by Nizami in 1188. It also functions in English as a short form of Adelaide, Delia or Ophelia, which would give it a Germanic or Greek root instead. Laila, elsewhere on this site, is the fuller Arabic spelling.
Lela in use
Lela peaked in the United States in 1921, when 907 babies were registered, and our data marks it stable rather than falling. It now ranks 2386th in the United States on 76 births and 3691st in England and Wales on 7, across 43,412 lifetime births in two of the seven markets we track. Our records carry it from 1880, and England and Wales ran its own peak of 11 births in 2022.
How popular is Lela?
In 2025, Lela was given to 76 babies in the United States. It is used consistently but remains uncommon.
Where Lela is used
US figures omit any name given to fewer than five babies in a year, so the rarest names are absent from the source rather than absent from use. Data & sources.
How Lela is spelled
Birth registers count each spelling separately, so every one has its own ranking.
| Spelling | What it is | Births on record |
|---|---|---|
| Léla | Léla is a rare spelling of Lela, written with an acute accent and recorded about 10 times, mostly in France. | 10 |
Names that peaked alongside Lela
These names rose and fell in the same era, which is why they tend to sound like they belong together.
Parents who like Lela also like
Names whose popularity has risen and fallen in step with Lela over the last century — the same taste, a different name.
Lela in other languages
The same name as it is spelled elsewhere — not shortenings, and not different names that merely sound alike. Each one has its own record here.
Sibling names for Lela
Names from the same era that won't rhyme or share an initial with Lela — the two things that make a sibling set grate.
Common questions about Lela
What does the name Lela mean?
Night — the Arabic layl — or a short form of Adelaide or Delia.
What is Layla and Majnun?
A seventh-century Arabic love story, retold in Persian by Nizami in 1188.
Is Laila the same name?
Yes — the fuller Arabic spelling, written up separately here.
How popular is Lela?
2386th in the United States, and stable rather than falling in our data.
Is Lela a girl's or a boy's name?
Lela is given almost entirely to girls in birth records.
How many syllables are in Lela?
Lela has 2 syllables.
Is Lela a good name?
That is not something records can settle, but they can tell you what you would be choosing. Lela currently ranks #2,386 in the United States. Its usage has held steady over the past decade. Everything else — how it sounds with your surname, who it reminds you of — is yours.