Selma — #2767 US girls' name

What the Data Says About Selma

The Social Security Administration has registered 26,820 babies named Selma between 1880 and 2024, spanning 145 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a girl's name, Selma currently holds the #2767 rank among girls for 2024. The name reached its historical peak in 1918, when 798 babies received it in a single year.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Selma performed strongest in the 1920s, accumulating 6,771 births during that ten-year window. Across the 15 decades of recorded activity, Selma shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in New York, which accounts for 4,725 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by Pennsylvania and Texas. In total, SSA state-level files list Selma in 43 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Selma in our reference dataset. These figures derive from SSA's annual national and state-level name files, which include any name appearing at least five times in a given year or state-year; names below that threshold are suppressed for privacy and therefore excluded from the totals shown here. The 26,820 total represents a lower bound — actual usage may be higher in years or states where the count fell below the disclosure floor. This page is provided for informational and research purposes only and does not constitute personal, legal, or naming advice.