Jael

Popularity, 1880–2025

girls named Jael boys named Jael

Girls and boys called Jael

years more girls than boys years more boys than girls

Both, throughout, without either side ever taking it over: 4,561 girls and 3,387 boys in all, and in 2025 the split was 157 to 147.

The girls’ share of each year’s babies of the name, in the 46 years in which at least 25 babies got it. The line touches the middle more often than there are crossings marked: a year or two on the other side is not a name changing hands, and only a move that holds for 5 counted years and reaches 60/40 is recorded as one. All 581 names that changed sex.

By the numbers

Total US births

7,948

Estimated living today

7,900

Median age today

13

Peak year

2012

Best rank

1,196th

Rank in 2025

1,388th

First recorded

1957

Girls / boys

4,561 / 3,387

How old the living Jaels are

born that year still alive today

Of the 7,948 babies given the name since 1957, about 7,900 are alive — 99 in every hundred. Roughly 5,300 of them are children and 12 are 65 or over. The dotted line is the median: half were born before 2012 and half after.

An estimate, not a count. SSA births aged forward through SSA cohort life tables, which know nothing about who left the country or arrived in it — so for a name that mostly came to America rather than being born in it, this is a floor rather than a figure. Where you fall among living Americans.

Where the name comes from

Origin Hebrew

From the name of a minor biblical character, Hebrew יעל.

Etymology from Wiktionary, used under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Notable Jaels

• Jaël Bestué (born 2000)Spanish athletics competitor

People named Jael with articles in the most Wikipedia languages. Data from Wikidata (CC0).

Where Jael is most common

• CA963
• TX828
• NY725
• FL572
• PA267
• NJ263
• IL209
• GA186
• NC145
• OH109

Relative to how many babies each state records, Jael is most concentrated in Florida (3.4×), Texas (2.2×), California (2.0×), New Jersey (1.9×).

Total births recorded in each state since 1910. Browse names by state.

Names of 2012

The most popular girls’ names the year Jael peaked:

• Sophia
• Emma
• Isabella
• Olivia
• Ava
• Emily

All the names of 2012

Jael elsewhere

Counts come from each country's own records and are not comparable with the US figures above, which cover different years and a different definition of a recorded name. Where a country writes the name several ways, the spellings are added together and the most common is shown. A row marked name registrations is counting something else: Portugal ranks each of a child's two given names separately, so a girl registered Maria Leonor is in both the Maria row and the Leonor row, and that figure is not a number of children.

Jael: births by region

Parts of a country counted above, not extra births. The share is what makes the regions comparable: they differ in size by a factor of three hundred.

By canton, Jael is most concentrated in Bern, where 0.35% of children were given it – 710 of them.

Jael: rank by region

In 2023, Jael was among the 10 most common names in 1 region of Italy.

Each of these is the top of a list the statistics office cut off somewhere – Italy after 10 names – and published nothing after. So a region missing here is one where the name fell outside what was published, not one where it went unused. Places are shared where names tie, and the further down a list a place is, the more names can share it.

Jael by city

One city over a few years, so these are much smaller numbers than the national ones above and not comparable with them.

Jael among the living

How many people each country's register counts under the name, rather than how many were given it in any one year. Each register was read on one date, and they are not the same date.

A count of people on a register – Finland on 4 August 2026 – and not of births, so it cannot be compared with the figures above. Names with very few bearers are withheld, and a dash in the first-forename column means the register would not say rather than that nobody goes by it.

Where Jael lives in Spain

Not a count of births but of people: 270 men called Jael and 437 women called Jael were living in Spain on 1 January 2025, of every age, born in any year. Where they live is not spread evenly.

Men: the provinces where it is densest

Listed in 14 of Spain's 52 provinces. In the other 38 it is either held by fewer than 5 people – the point below which the source withholds a name – or it fell past the 5,000 names the source will print for one province. Neither means nobody there is called it. The rate is the source's own, not a share worked out here.

Women: the provinces where it is densest

Listed in 27 of Spain's 52 provinces. In the other 25 it is either held by fewer than 5 people – the point below which the source withholds a name – or it fell past the 5,000 names the source will print for one province. Neither means nobody there is called it. The rate is the source's own, not a share worked out here.

Related names

• Jaelyn
• Jaelynn
• Jaeden
• Jaedyn
• Jae
• Jaela
• Jaeda
• Jaelin
• Jaedon
• Jaelen
• Jaelah
• Jaeger

Jael against another name

Two names on one chart, with the year one overtook the other.

• Jael vs Jaelyn
• Jael vs Jaelynn
• Jael vs Jaeden
• Jael vs Jaedyn
• Jael vs Jae
• Jael vs Jaela

Compare Jael with a name of your own