How popular is the baby name Ariel in the United States right now? How popular was it historically? Use the popularity graph and data table below to find out! Plus, see all the blog posts that mention the name Ariel.

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Popularity of the baby name Ariel


Posts that mention the name Ariel

Popular baby names in Israel, 2015

Flag of Israel
Flag of Israel

According to data released earlier this week by Israel’s Central Bureau for Statistics (CBS), the top three most popular baby names in the country overall in 2015 were:

  1. Mohammed
  2. Yosef (used for male babies — both Muslim and Jewish)
  3. Ariel (used for Jewish babies — both male and female)

The top baby names for Jewish babies specifically were Noa and Noam:

Girl names (Jewish)

1. Noa
2. Tamar
3. Maya
4. Avigayil/Avigail/Abigail
5. Talya/Talia
6. Adele
7. Shira
8. Ayala/Ayela
9. Yael
10. Sarah/Sara

Boy names (Jewish)

1. Noam
2. David
3. Ori/Uri
4. Ariel
5. Eitan
6. Yosef
7. Itai/Itay
8. Yonatan
9. Daniel
10. Moshe

The CBS also reported that the boy names Dror, Yagel/Yigal, and Alroi/Elroi/Elroy each saw a sharp rise in usage in 2015.

The top baby names for Muslim babies specifically were Maryam and Mohammad:

Girl names (Muslim)

1. Maryam/Miryam/Mariam
2. Sha’im
3. Jana/Janah
4. Lin
5. Lian/Layan
6. Alin/Aline
7. Sa’ara

Boy names (Muslim)

1. Mohammad
2. Ahmed
3. Yosef
4. Omar
5. Adam
6. Jud/Jod
7. Abed
8. Ali
9. Amir
10. Ibrahim

The 2012 rankings for Israel are pretty similar.

Update, Oct. 2017: Here’s an interesting fact about Israel’s 2014 rankings (which I never wrote a post about): “Eitan soared in popularity to No. 5 from 10th place in 2014, a surge attributed to that year’s war in Gaza dubbed Operation Protective Edge, or Mivtza Tzuk Eitan in Hebrew.” (Source: Times of Israel)

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Flag of Israel (public domain)

What influenced the baby name Ovadia in Israel?

Rabbi Ovadia Yosef (1920-2013)
Rabbi Ovadia Yosef

According to Israel’s Central Bureau of Statistics, the name Ovadia has become trendy in the Middle Eastern country.

Only 36 baby boys in Israel were named Ovadia in 2012. “However, following the death of spiritual leader Rabbi Ovadia Yosef in 2013, 117 babies were given this name and in 2014, 209 newborns were named after the rabbi.”

Influential cleric Ovadia Yosef, who founded the ultra-Orthodox Shas party in the mid-1980s, died in October of 2013 at the age of 93.

The baby name Ovadia — the Hebrew form of Obadiah — also saw a modest increase in usage in the United States during the same time frame:

  • 2015: 9 baby boys named Ovadia
  • 2014: 15 baby boys named Ovadia (6 born in NY)
  • 2013: 11 baby boys named Ovadia (9 born in NY)
  • 2012: unlisted
  • 2011: 5 baby boys named Ovadia (all born in NY)

Despite its trendiness, Ovadia wasn’t popular enough to rank among the top Jewish boy names in Israel in 2014:

Top boy names among JewsTop boy names among Muslims
Noam
Ori/Uri
David
Yosef
Eitan
Itay
Ariel
Daniel
Yonatan
Moshe		Muhammad
Yousef
Omar
Abed
Adam
Ali
Ibrahim
Mahmoud
Amir
Haled

And here are Israel’s top girl names:

Top girl names among JewsTop girl names among Muslims
Noa
Tamar
Shira
Maya
Yael
Adele
Talia
Avigail
Ayala
Sara		Miryam
Jana
Lian
Malak
Aline
Lyn
Nur

Of the 176,427 babies born in Israel in 2014, 136,000 (77.1%) were born into Jewish families and 40,427 (22.9%) were born into Arabic families.

Sources:

Image: Adapted from Nomination of the New Chief Rabbis by Dan Hadani collection/National Library of Israel/The Pritzker Family National Photography Collection under CC BY 4.0.

[Latest update: Nov. 2024]

Top Hebrew baby names in Israel, 5775

Flag of Israel
Flag of Israel

According to data from Israel’s Population and Immigration Authority, the most popular Jewish baby names in Israel for the Hebrew calendar year 5775 (September 25, 2014, to September 13, 2015) were Tamar and Ori.

The other top names were…

Girl NamesBoy Names
1. Tamar
2. Noa
3. Talia
4. Shira
5. Yael
6. Avigayil		1. Ori
2. Eitan
3. Ariel
4. Noam
5. David
6. Yoseph

The top Jewish names for the previous year, 5774, were Tamar and Yosef.

(This list doesn’t include the names of Muslim babies and Christian babies born in Israel.)

Source: 5775: How Many Were Born and What Are the Most Common Names?

Image: Adapted from Flag of Israel (public domain)

How did “Bambi” influence baby names in the early 1940s?

The characters Bambi and Faline from the movie "Bambi" (1942)
Bambi and Faline from “Bambi”

Plenty of Disney Princesses (Ariel, Mulan, Tiana, Elsa, etc.) have had an impact on the U.S. baby name charts. But two of the earliest Disney characters to affect the charts weren’t princesses. In fact, they weren’t even human. They were white-tailed deer.

The classic animated film Bambi came out in August of 1942. The next year, the baby names Bambi and Faline both debuted as girl names in the U.S. baby name data.

Bambi:

  • 1945: 9 baby girls named Bambi
  • 1944: 7 baby girls named Bambi
  • 1943: 8 baby girls named Bambi [debut]
  • 1942: unlisted
  • 1941: unlisted

Faline:

  • 1945: unlisted
  • 1944: unlisted
  • 1943: 5 baby girls named Faline [debut]
  • 1942: unlisted
  • 1941: unlisted

The name Faline remains rare to this day, but the name Bambi went on to be given to hundreds of baby girls per year from the mid-’50s to the mid-’60s, then again from the mid-’70s to the mid-’80s.

The New York Times states that “Bambi reached peak popularity in 1979 after the release of the song “Who Killed Bambi?” in a movie about the Sex Pistols, an influential punk rock band.” It’s an interesting coincidence, but I doubt the song had any influence on usage.

The Disney movie was based on the 1923 novel Bambi, Eine Lebensgeschichte aus dem Walde (Bambi, a Life in the Woods) by Austrian author Felix Salten. In German, Faline’s name is pronounced fah-LEE-neh (as opposed to fah-LEEN in English).

Source: After ‘Frozen,’ a Baby Boomlet of Elsas

P.S. StoryCorps recently ran a story on 80-year-old Donnie Dunagan, one of the voices of Bambi.

P.P.S. In the book’s sequel, Bambi’s Children (1939), Bambi and Faline’s sons are named Geno and Gurri.