Arial
Arial was given to 8 girls in 2025, #11,036 among girls’ names; 1,197 Americans have been recorded with it since 1981 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 1,180 Americans named Arial and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 25 years old and half are between 18 and 32.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Arial by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Arial mean?
Wiktionary, Welsh section
Arial is “a male given name from arial (“vigour”); variant form Ariel”
/ˈarjal/
Meaning: Wiktionary, Welsh section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Arial?
#11,036 among girls’ names, 2025
Arial fell from #4,740 in 2015 to #11,036 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 16.2 to 5.0 per million.
69 babies in 1991, the peak
Arial peaked in 1991, when 69 girls were given it, #1,991 among girls’ names. The 8 births of 2025 are 12% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 8 | #11,036 | 5.0 |
| 2022 | 7 | #12,365 | 4.3 |
| 2021 | 8 | #11,243 | 4.9 |
| 2020 | 8 | #11,198 | 4.9 |
| 2019 | 17 | #6,734 | 10.1 |
| 2018 | 11 | #9,214 | 6.5 |
| 2017 | 13 | #8,339 | 7.5 |
| 2016 | 19 | #6,432 | 10.7 |
| 2015 | 29 | #4,740 | 16.2 |
| 2014 | 35 | #4,185 | 19.6 |
Every recorded year (43)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2013 | 20 | #6,274 | 11.4 |
| 2012 | 21 | #6,137 | 11.9 |
| 2011 | 18 | #6,882 | 10.2 |
| 2010 | 36 | #4,116 | 20.3 |
| 2009 | 28 | #5,105 | 15.2 |
| 2008 | 30 | #4,900 | 15.9 |
| 2007 | 31 | #4,693 | 16.1 |
| 2006 | 53 | #3,136 | 27.9 |
| 2005 | 37 | #3,877 | 20.0 |
| 2004 | 41 | #3,566 | 22.3 |
| 2003 | 41 | #3,472 | 22.4 |
| 2002 | 63 | #2,498 | 35.1 |
| 2001 | 47 | #3,007 | 26.1 |
| 2000 | 43 | #3,169 | 23.7 |
| 1999 | 42 | #3,099 | 23.7 |
| 1998 | 48 | #2,757 | 27.2 |
| 1997 | 51 | #2,514 | 29.3 |
| 1996 | 45 | #2,717 | 25.7 |
| 1995 | 36 | #3,150 | 20.5 |
| 1994 | 25 | #4,120 | 14.0 |
| 1993 | 33 | #3,347 | 18.2 |
| 1992 | 37 | #3,088 | 20.1 |
| 1991 | 69 | #1,991 | 36.8 |
| 1990 | 45 | #2,598 | 23.7 |
| 1989 | 14 | #5,852 | 7.6 |
| 1988 | 12 | #6,302 | 6.7 |
| 1987 | 15 | #5,082 | 8.6 |
| 1986 | 12 | #5,774 | 7.0 |
| 1985 | 13 | #5,379 | 7.6 |
| 1984 | 10 | #6,330 | 5.9 |
| 1983 | 14 | #4,899 | 8.4 |
| 1982 | 7 | #8,290 | 4.1 |
| 1981 | 5 | #10,523 | 3.0 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Arial a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Arial has been recorded only for girls: SSA lists no boys with the name in 43 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Arial: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Arial, and how old are they?
1,180 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 1,197 Americans ever recorded as Arial. The median Arial alive today is 25 years old; half are between 18 and 32.
The 2020 Census counted 1,370 people named Arial (1,262 women and girls, 108 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 1,155 born in the U.S. The Census count is 19% above that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 383 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 623 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 174 |
An estimate, not a count. SSA’s files count people born in the United States who received a Social Security number, so anyone born abroad is not in them; before 1937 most people got a number as adults, and their survival is counted from that age.
Living estimate: SSA births carried forward with the survival rates in SSA’s cohort life tables (2024 Trustees Report) for each birth year and sex. How the estimate is made. Count: Census Bureau, first names in the 2020 Census (released April 14, 2026; names reported 100 or more times, with the Bureau’s disclosure-avoidance adjustment).
Names spelled alike
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 107,568 babies since 1880, Arial is the third most given (1.1% of them). In 2025 it was given to 8 of their 1,445 babies (<1%), the fourth most given that year.
Spelled alike: names in the SSA national file with the same pattern of letters and sounds and at most two letters apart, and Wiktionary’s listed forms; births since 1880 and in 2025, and each name’s peak year, from the SSA national file, published May 8, 2026. Some are separate names, not spellings of one.
Names that rose and fell in the same decades as Arial
Names whose births rose and fell across the same decades, measured on each decade’s share of births.
Similar histories: each decade’s share of births, from the SSA national file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
More about Arial and names like it
- Compare Arial and ArielBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 1990sArial peaked in 1991.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Arial since 1910.
- Welsh namesWiktionary’s origin for Arial: every such name, by how often it is given.
- The top names of 1991The year the most babies were named Arial.
- The names of Generation ZMost people named Arial alive today were born 1997-2012.
- Names starting with AMost given first.