Shanay
Girls' nameMeaning not yet documented
Shanay has been given to 1,465 babies in the U.S. since 1970. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1992, with 153 recorded.
Babies named Shanay, 2012
1 in 732,000
Shanay over time, 1880–2025
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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.
How common is Shanay?
Shanay had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2012, the last year it was published.
- Among all babies, 2012
- 1 in 732,000
- 5 of 3,657,590 births
- Among girls only
- 1 in 352,000
- <0.01% of girls
- Rank, 2012
- Unranked
- Fewer than 5 uses
- Coin-flip room size
- 507,051 kids
- Even odds of a second one
Where Shanay sits on the popularity scale
Chance at least one other child shares the name
If the other children were drawn at random from the 2012 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.
Put another way: gather 507,051 children born in 2012 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Shanay. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.
When Shanays were born
Half of everyone ever recorded as Shanay was born before 1989 — so the typical Shanay is around 36 today.
- Biggest decade
- 1980s
- 42.5% of all use
- Born in the last 25 years
- 62.8%
- A modern name
- Recorded since 1950
- 1,415
- People you could plausibly meet
1980s — 42.5% of all recorded uses (602).
Is Shanay 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
- New entry
- Not ranked then
- Rank vs 10 years ago
- —
- Not ranked then
- Births vs 10 years ago
- —
- Not published both years
- Share of its own peak
- 0%
- Peak was 1992 (153)
- Years since peak
- 33
- Years
- Year-to-year steadiness
- Volatile
- 25.6% average annual change
Spellings of Shanay
Shanay is not the most common spelling — Sandy is, with 16.3% against Shanay's 0.33%.
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 Shanay is used
Across 1910–2025, Shanay was most concentrated in Maryland — about 1 in 33,333 girls, against 1 in 149,472 across all states with data. It was least common in Virginia (1 in —).
Most concentrated
- 1Maryland1 in 33,333
- 2California1 in 100,000
- 3District of Columbia1 in 100,000
- 4Florida1 in 100,000
- 5Michigan1 in 100,000
- 6New Jersey1 in 100,000
- 7New York1 in 100,000
- 8Ohio1 in 100,000
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. Shanay has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.
Shanay around the world
Where Shanay 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 & Wales1996–2018#5,666in 2018
- Canada2002–2002#2,286in 2002
- South Australia1992–2010#801in 2010
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.
Shanay by the numbers
The raw record for each sex the name is used for.
As a girl's name
Names similar to Shanay
Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.
Sibling names for Shanay
Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.