Name Awesome

Shonda

Girls' name

Blend of Shona and Rhonda

Shonda has been given to 7,444 babies in the U.S. since 1954. 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 1970, with 510 recorded.

Babies named Shonda, 2008

1 in 786,000

Shonda over time, 1880–2025

Girls
020040060018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Shonda: meaning, origin, and history

Blend of Shona and Rhonda

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Shonda means

Shonda is a blend of Shona and Rhonda.

Origin, language, and formation

Shonda is used in English.

Shonda is a modern formation.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Shona and Rhonda.

Pronunciation and spelling

In English, Shonda is pronounced /ˈʃɔn.də/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 7,444 girls were recorded with the name Shonda between 1954 and 2008. Its highest annual count was 510 in 1970; its best national rank was #419 in 1973.

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 Shonda?

Shonda had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2008, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2008
1 in 786,000
5 of 3,930,727 births
Among girls only
1 in 378,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2008
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
544,916 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Shonda 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 2008 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 544,916 children born in 2008 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Shonda. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Shondas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Shonda was born before 1974 — so the typical Shonda is around 51 today.

Median birth year
1974
About 51 years old
Biggest decade
1970s
54.7% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
14.4%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
7,444
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1970s — 54.7% of all recorded uses (4,074).

Is Shonda 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 1970 (510)
Years since peak
55
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
25.6% average annual change
Best rank ever
#419
1973

Spellings of Shonda

Shonda is not the most common spelling — Rhonda is, with 31.9% against Shonda's 1.1%.

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 Shonda is used

Across 1910–2025, Shonda was most concentrated in Louisiana — about 1 in 7,143 girls, against 1 in 25,254 across all states with data. It was least common in West Virginia (1 in —).

014 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Louisiana1 in 7,143
  2. 2Mississippi1 in 7,692
  3. 3Georgia1 in 10,000
  4. 4South Carolina1 in 11,111
  5. 5Alabama1 in 12,500
  6. 6Kentucky1 in 12,500
  7. 7North Carolina1 in 12,500
  8. 8Oklahoma1 in 12,500

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

Notable people named Shonda

People whose public names include Shonda, 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.

Shonda in other languages

Cross-language forms and variants of Shonda. Linked forms have their own page here.

ChandaChondaShandaShaunda

Variant forms from Wikidata (CC0). Most are used mainly outside the United States; U.S. birth records statistics cover US usage only.

Shonda 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
#419
1973
Peak year
1970
510 that year
First recorded
1954
Last recorded
2008
All-time count
7,444
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Shonda

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

ShoshanaShonnaSholandaMarandaLorindaMyrandaBrindaJacindaShandaRandaChandaShontaMalindaKendaShonaSholondaShonteHerlindaBriandaHindaGlindaVondaGlyndaLucinda

Names with a curve like Shonda

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

LashawnTawanaTishaLatanyaWindyCarieTawnyaTawandaLatoniaMistiKarrieKisha

Sibling names for Shonda

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 Shonda

Top names of 1970, Shonda's peak yearThe 1970s in fullOther names that peaked in 1973Girls' names starting with S