girl's name
Nyla
NY-luh
- Origin Arabic
- Gender Girl
- Letters 4
- Popularity Top 1000 (US)
- Births on record 32,834
the United States
#236
2025 births
Nyla is a girl's name with more than one plausible origin. It is most often connected to the Arabic Nailah, meaning one who attains or achieves, and is also used as a modern respelling of Nila. Sources disagree, and the name is genuinely at home in more than one tradition.
- Nyla is a name of Arabic origin.
- Peaked in 2024, when 1,344 babies were given the name.
- It has been rising over the past decade.
- Today about 1 in 2,521 babies in the United States is given this name.
- First appears in US birth records in 1915.
Nyla over time
Births per decade in the United States, 1910s 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 |
|---|---|
| 1910s | 47 |
| 1920s | 245 |
| 1930s | 371 |
| 1940s | 506 |
| 1950s | 570 |
| 1960s | 271 |
| 1970s | 186 |
| 1980s | 184 |
| 1990s | 800 |
| 2000s | 6,472 |
| 2010s | 10,359 |
| 2020s (to 2025) | 7,703 |
What Nyla means
Nyla is usually read as achiever or winner, through the Arabic Nailah. A separate line treats it as a variant of Nila, from a Sanskrit word for dark blue, and a third simply as a modern coinage built from popular sounds. No single reading accounts for all its use.
Where Nyla comes from
Nyla has at least three defensible derivations. The strongest is the Arabic Nailah, from a root meaning to obtain or attain, giving the sense of one who achieves; the spelling with a Y is an English-language adaptation. A second connects it to Nila, from the Sanskrit nila, dark blue or indigo, a color word that produced several South Asian names. A third treats it as an independent modern formation on the pattern of Kayla, Layla and Mila, which would explain its appearance in the American records as early as 1915 without any obvious community source. Its use today spans all of these.
Nyla in use
Nyla charts in all seven countries we track, which is unusual for a name outside the top 500 in any of them individually.
How popular is Nyla?
In 2025, Nyla was given to 1,315 babies in the United States, ranking #236 that year. It is a well-established, commonly used name.
Where Nyla 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.
Names that peaked alongside Nyla
These names rose and fell in the same era, which is why they tend to sound like they belong together.
Parents who like Nyla also like
Names whose popularity has risen and fallen in step with Nyla over the last century — the same taste, a different name.
2 nicknames for Nyla
Each one is a name in its own right — the figure underneath is how it is doing today, so you can see which short forms are rising and which have faded.
Nyla 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.
- Arabic
- Naila
Sibling names for Nyla
Names from the same era that won't rhyme or share an initial with Nyla — the two things that make a sibling set grate.
Common questions about Nyla
What does the name Nyla mean?
Most often one who attains or achieves, through the Arabic Nailah. It is also read as a form of Nila, from a Sanskrit word for dark blue.
Is Nyla an Arabic name?
It is used in Arabic-speaking families as a spelling of Nailah, and it is also used widely outside that tradition, so it belongs comfortably to both.
How do you pronounce Nyla?
NY-luh, with the first syllable rhyming with high.
How popular is the name Nyla?
In 2025, Nyla was given to 1,315 babies in the United States, ranking #236 that year. It is a well-established, commonly used name.
Is Nyla a girl's or a boy's name?
Nyla is given almost entirely to girls in birth records.
When was Nyla most popular?
Nyla peaked in 2024, when 1,344 babies were given the name. It has been rising over the past decade.
What are the nicknames for Nyla?
Nyla is usually shortened to Ny and Lala.
Is Nyla a good name?
That is not something records can settle, but they can tell you what you would be choosing. Nyla currently ranks #215 in the United States. It has been rising over the past decade. Everything else — how it sounds with your surname, who it reminds you of — is yours.