Entry № 5922 · Arabic origin

Lila Lila — Meaning, Origin & Baby Name Popularity

/ LIE-lah /
Gender
Girl
Origin
Arabic
Meaning
"Night; divine play"
Syllables
2
First recorded
Ancient

A name that means "night; divine play".

Lila has multiple origins. In Arabic, it is a variant of Layla (ليلى), meaning "night." In Sanskrit, līlā (लीला) is a profound philosophical concept meaning "divine play" — the universe as the playful creation of the divine.

Lila has been rising rapidly in the U.S. since 2003.

Night; divine play — a Arabic name.

The name in its native script.

ليلى · लीला
Transliteration
Laylā / Līlā
Pronunciation
/ ˈlaɪ.lə /
Root
Grammatical form

Where Lila stands.

Lila does not currently appear in the US Social Security Administration's top 1,000 girls' names, so we don't publish a US rank or birth count for it. That says nothing about the name's standing elsewhere in the world — only that it sits outside the ranked US data we rely on.

Lilas before her.

Real people
Lila Bell Wallace
American magazine publisher, co-founder of Reader's Digest.
1889 – 1984
In fiction
Lila
Heroine of Elena Ferrante's Neapolitan Novels.
2011 onward

Names connected to Lila.

The number behind Lila.

7

The Seeker

In Pythagorean numerology the letters of Lila reduce to 7, The Seeker. This is a traditional interpretive system, not a factual claim about the name.