Name Awesome

Shanta

Girls' name

Pacified, calm

Shanta has been given to 5,254 babies in the U.S. since 1958. 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 1978, with 360 recorded.

Babies named Shanta, 2014

1 in 741,000

Shanta over time, 1880–2025

GirlsBoys
010020030040018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Shanta: meaning, origin, and history

Pacified, calm

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Shanta means

Shanta means “pacified, calm”.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Shanta is used in Hinduism, Hindi, Marathi and Nepali.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 5,112 girls were recorded with the name Shanta between 1958 and 2014. Its highest annual count was 360 in 1978; its best national rank was #518 in 1978.

In the United States, 142 boys were recorded with the name Shanta between 1971 and 1989. Its highest annual count was 18 in 1978; its best national rank was #2,553 in 1978.

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.

How common is Shanta?

Shanta had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2014, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2014
1 in 741,000
5 of 3,706,812 births
Among girls only
1 in 357,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2014
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
513,874 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Shanta 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 2014 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 513,874 children born in 2014 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Shanta. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Shantas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Shanta was born before 1980 — so the typical Shanta is around 45 today.

Median birth year
1980
About 45 years old
Biggest decade
1980s
39.6% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
15.5%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
5,112
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1980s — 39.6% of all recorded uses (2,026).

Is Shanta 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 1978 (360)
Years since peak
47
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
20.0% average annual change
Best rank ever
#518
1978

Spellings of Shanta

Shanta is not the most common spelling — Shawna is, with 8.5% against Shanta's 0.95%.

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 Shanta is used

Across 1910–2025, Shanta was most concentrated in Mississippi — about 1 in 9,091 girls, against 1 in 33,726 across all states with data. It was least common in Wisconsin (1 in —).

011 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Mississippi1 in 9,091
  2. 2South Carolina1 in 12,500
  3. 3Georgia1 in 14,286
  4. 4Louisiana1 in 16,667
  5. 5Alabama1 in 20,000
  6. 6Illinois1 in 20,000
  7. 7North Carolina1 in 20,000
  8. 8Virginia1 in 20,000

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. Shanta has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Shanta around the world

Where Shanta 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
    1997–1997
    #3,824
    in 1997

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics. ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0.

Notable people named Shanta

People whose public names include Shanta, backed by Wikidata given-name records and ordered by linked Wikimedia pages. The name may be a middle name.

People data from Wikidata (CC0). Fame is measured, not judged — the order reflects how widely each person is documented, not the U.S. birth records popularity this page is otherwise about.

Shanta by the numbers

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

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#518
1978
Peak year
1978
360 that year
First recorded
1958
Last recorded
2014
All-time count
5,112
Count in 2025
Under 5

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#2,553
1978
Peak year
1978
18 that year
First recorded
1971
Last recorded
1989
All-time count
142
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Shanta

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

ShawntaShauntaShastaSharlaShanaeShailaShayneShanelSharaShanellShainaShamyaShaniShaniyaShantiShayleeShaniaShaelynShaynaShakiraShanayaShanonShanteShanice

Names with a curve like Shanta

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Shanta, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

SharondaShalondaLashandaTanikaToshaLatoshaMellisaLakeshiaBrandeeJasonSheritaDusty

Sibling names for Shanta

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 Shanta

Top names of 1978, Shanta's peak yearThe 1970s in fullOther names that peaked in 1978Girls' names starting with SNepali Girl NamesNepali Names