Meaning and history
Ophelia is derived from Greek ὠφέλεια (opheleia), meaning “help” or “advantage.” It was a rare ancient Greek name that was either rediscovered or recreated by the poet Jacopo Sannazaro for a character in his 1480 poem Arcadia, and later borrowed by Shakespeare for Hamlet (1600), where it is the name of Polonius’s daughter and Hamlet’s potential love interest, who becomes insane and drowns herself after Hamlet kills her father. Despite this tragic association, the name has been in use since the 19th century.
20062006: 47 births, rank #3,414
2007: 66 births, rank #2,750
2008: 101 births, rank #2,042
2009: 76 births, rank #2,485
2010: 96 births, rank #2,059
20112011: 109 births, rank #1,840
2012: 139 births, rank #1,566
2013: 185 births, rank #1,277
2014: 226 births, rank #1,121
2015: 276 births, rank #978
20162016: 533 births, rank #582
2017: 765 births, rank #417
2018: 839 births, rank #373
2019: 813 births, rank #385
2020: 794 births, rank #391
20212021: 1,014 births, rank #321
2022: 1,169 births, rank #271
2023: 1,177 births, rank #265
2024: 1,223 births, rank #259
20252025: 1,183 births, rank #264
Ophelia moved from #259 to #264 for girls between 2024 and 2025. Its highest annual birth count came in 2024, with 1,223 births.