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Arial

#11,036 in 2025Girls' name

Literal meaning not recorded

Arial has been given to 1,197 babies in the U.S. since 1981. In 2025 it ranked #11,036 of 17,293 girls’ names in use. Its peak year was 1991, with 69 recorded.

Babies named Arial, 2025

1 in 414,000

Arial over time, 1880–2025

Girls
02040608018801900192019401960198020002020

Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Arial: meaning, origin, and history

Literal meaning not recorded

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Arial means

Arial is a given name.

Origin, language, and formation

Arial is used in Welsh.

Pronunciation and spelling

In Welsh, Arial is pronounced /ˈarjal/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 1,197 girls were recorded with the name Arial between 1981 and 2025. Its highest annual count was 69 in 1991; its best national rank was #1,991 in 1991.

Over 5 years its rank rose, from #11,198 in 2020 to #11,036 in 2025. Over 10 years its rank fell, from #4,740 in 2015 to #11,036 in 2025.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Arial?

Everything below is computed from the 2025 data — the most recent year available.

Among all babies, 2025
1 in 414,000
8 of 3,315,165 births
Among girls only
1 in 201,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2025
#11,036
of 17,293 girls’ names in use
Coin-flip room size
287,238 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Arial sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Olivia (13,544)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 2025 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 287,238 children born in 2025 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Arial. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Arials were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Arial was born before 2001 — so the typical Arial is around 24 today.

Median birth year
2001
About 24 years old
Biggest decade
1990s
36.0% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
51.9%
A modern name
Recorded since 1950
1,197
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1990s — 36.0% of all recorded uses (431).

Is Arial rising or falling?

Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.

Rank vs 1 year ago
—
Not ranked then
Rank vs 5 years ago
+162
Places climbed
Rank vs 10 years ago
−6,296
Places dropped
Births vs 10 years ago
0.28×
Fewer babies than then
Share of its own peak
11.6%
Peak was 1991 (69)
Years since peak
34
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
26.2% average annual change
Best rank ever
#1,991
1991

Spellings of Arial

Arial is not the most common spelling — Maria is, with 32.6% against Arial's 0.07%.

Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.

Where Arial is used

Across 1910–2025, Arial was most concentrated in Texas — about 1 in 100,000 girls, against 1 in 323,321 across all states with data. It was least common in Wisconsin (1 in —).

01 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Texas1 in 100,000
  2. 2California1 in —
  3. 3Georgia1 in —
  4. 4Illinois1 in —
  5. 5Indiana1 in —
  6. 6Minnesota1 in —
  7. 7Ohio1 in —
  8. 8Wisconsin1 in —

Shading is the share of that state's recorded girls given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Arial has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Arial around the world

Where Arial ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.

  • England & Wales
    2015–2015
    #4,736
    in 2015
  • Canada
    2003–2011
    #3,211
    in 2011
  • South Australia
    2006–2006
    #782
    in 2006

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics, Statistics Canada and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Arial by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
#11,036
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
Up 162
Best rank ever
#1,991
1991
Peak year
1991
69 that year
First recorded
1981
Last recorded
2025
All-time count
1,197
Count in 2025
8

Names similar to Arial

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

ArinaArianArisaArizaAriesArikaAriamArishaAriellArisArianyArianiArieleArissaArinAriannArianahArilynAriyaAriyanArianeArionArielaArica

Sibling names for Arial

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Arial

Top names of 1991, Arial's peak yearThe 1990s in fullOther names that peaked in 1991Girls' names starting with A