Shanessa
Girls' nameMeaning not yet documented
Shanessa has been given to 131 babies in the U.S. since 1973. 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 1989, with 17 recorded.
Babies named Shanessa, 2012
1 in 523,000
Shanessa 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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.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 Shanessa?
Shanessa 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 523,000
- 7 of 3,657,590 births
- Among girls only
- 1 in 252,000
- <0.01% of girls
- Rank, 2012
- Unranked
- Fewer than 5 uses
- Coin-flip room size
- 362,179 kids
- Even odds of a second one
Where Shanessa 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 362,179 children born in 2012 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Shanessa. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.
When Shanessas were born
Half of everyone ever recorded as Shanessa was born before 1990 — so the typical Shanessa is around 35 today.
- Biggest decade
- 1980s
- 34.4% of all use
- Born in the last 25 years
- 74.0%
- A modern name
- Recorded since 1950
- 131
- People you could plausibly meet
1980s — 34.4% of all recorded uses (45).
Is Shanessa 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 1989 (17)
- Years since peak
- 36
- Years
- Year-to-year steadiness
- Volatile
- 45.4% average annual change
Spellings of Shanessa
Shanessa is not the most common spelling — Vanessa is, with 90.5% against Shanessa's 0.05%.
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.
Shanessa around the world
Where Shanessa 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 & Wales2007–2011#5,785in 2011
- Ireland2005–2007#842in 2007
- Canada1996–2006#2,939in 2006
Popularity data from Office for National Statistics, Central Statistics Office and Statistics Canada. ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. CSO data under CC BY 4.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence.
Shanessa by the numbers
The raw record for each sex the name is used for.
Names similar to Shanessa
Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.
Sibling names for Shanessa
Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.