Presented by

The first name 
Selah

Selah is a first name typically given to girls, but in rare cases also used as a boys name.

Selah – popular and common in the US

The name Selah isn’t among the current fashionable names in our top 10 stats, but nonetheless, it’s still very popular and common. In our SmartGenius ranking of all girls names, Selah ranks 425. Recently, out of every 10,000 newborn girls, approximately 4 were named Selah. If you polled the whole US population – children, adults and seniors – you’d find less than one in 10,000 to be named Selah.

You won't believe all there is 
to discover about the name
 
Selah

What does the name 
Selah mean?

The name Selah comes from a Hebrew word used in the Bible. Its meaning and origin are unknown, but it is probably meant to indicate a musical pause.

As a given name,... Selah is used in the U.S. and in the Netherlands.

Selah -
keeping with the times

Selah is a fairly recent phenomenon. In the past, the name wasn't really on the radar of expectant parents. Then, unexpectedly, Selah cried out for attention, reaching its peak in popularity at #330 in our SmartGenius statistics in the year 2022. People over 50 probably didn't have classmates named Selah, for there were many years in which not a single parent chose this first name for their daughter. Although it also has never been in the top 100 of most popular first names, Selah seems to have been in vogue for a while, especially since the beginning of the new millennium.

In years where the graph has no value, the name Selah was given less than five times or even none at all in the entire USA.

Selah has 5 letters 
and begins with an S

Well, you might say, you probably figured that out yourself! But what you might not know is: The letter S is a very popular first letter for girls' names. That’s because 9.3% of all common girls’ names in the US begin with this letter. Only the first letter A is more common for girls' names.

With five letters, the name Selah is comparatively short. In fact, 17.0% of all common first names in the US consist of exactly five letters. Only 7% of all first names are even shorter, while 75% have more than five letters. On average, first names in the US (not counting hyphenated names) are 6.5 letters long. There are no significant differences between boys' and girls' names.

That means that if 9.3% of all girls' names start with an S, this initial letter occurs nearly three times as often as all other letters on average. And by the way: Of all the girls' names that start with an S, Susan is the most common.

Other names with 
S, e, l, a and h

If you take all the letters in the name Selah – S, e, l, a and h – and put them together again, you can form other names, such as Saleh or others.

With hands, flags and sounds 
How to say Selah

If your name is Selah and someone asks after your name, you can of course just tell them what it is. But sometimes that isn't so easy - what if it's too loud, and you don't understand them well? Or what if the other person is so far away that you can see them but not hear them? In these situations, you can communicate your name in so many other ways: you call spell it, sign it, or even use a flag to wave it...

This is how you spell the name Selah

So that everyone really understands you when you have to spell the name Selah, you can simply say:

Sun

Elephant

Lion

Apple

Hat

This is how the name Selah is spelled in the NATO phonetic alphabet

The NATO alphabet often helps people spell words on the phone or radio when there are communication problems.

How do you write Selah in Braille?

Braille is made up of dots, which the blind and visually impaired can feel to read words.

Selah

Selah

You want to tell a deaf person that your name is Selah

Just use American Sign Language!

The name Selah is particularly colorful in the Semaphore flag signaling system!

These flags are used for maritime communication - each flag represents a letter.

S
E
L
A
H

Have you ever waved the name Selah

In the navy, sailors of two ships might wave flags to each other to send messages. A sailor holds two flags in specific positions to represent different letters.

S
E
L
A
H

Beeping like crazy...

In Morse code, letters and other characters are represented only by a series of short and long tones. For example, a short tone followed by a long tone stands for the letter A. Selah sounds like this: