Bella

Diminutive of Isabella, Italian

"beautiful"

Bella Origin and Meaning

The name Bella is a girl's name of Italian origin meaning "beautiful".

Everything ella, from Ella to Bella to Arabella, is red hot right now. Bella is one of the most, well, beautiful girl names starting with B. It carried a hint of a nice Old World grandmotherly veneer, until it became attached to Twilight's Bella Swan.

Bella derived as a diminutive of Isabella and other names with the suffix -bella, such as Anabella and Arabella, but has a meaning all its own: beautiful.That's because Bella is related to the word for "beautiful" in languages including Spanish, Italian, Latin, Portuguese, and Greek. Belle means "beautiful" in French.

If you're thinking of naming your daughter Bella, be aware that there are a lot of little girls whose proper names are Isabella, Arabella etc. who are called Bella, so you may hear the name more frequently than you'd guess judging by popularity statistics.

In pre-Twilight literature, Bella Wilfer is the central character in Charles Dickens's Our Mutual Friend.

Mark Ruffalo, Billy Bob Thornton, David Boreanaz and Eddie Murphy are all dads to Bellas. A strong feminist namesake is Bella Abzug. One current Bella is child star turned pop star Bella Thorne, born Annabella.

Bella was in use as far back as the thirteenth century, then disappeared until the eighteenth when it became fashionable.

Today, Bella is among the most popular dog names.

Bella Rank in US Top 1000

# 106 in the US

Bella Rank in Nameberry Top 1000

# 431 on Nameberry

Bella Popularity

• 106 US 2023
• 431 Nameberry 2024
• 166 Canada 2023
• 45 Future 2028
• 77 England 2022
• 80 Scotland 2023
• 78 Ireland 2023
• 76 Australia 2023
• 43 New Zealand 2023
• 202 Germany 2016
• 97 Sweden 2019
• 26 Hungary 2023
• 2 Dogs 2023
• 2 Cats 2023

20 Names Similar to Bella

These 20 names were selected by our users that were looking for other names like Bella.

• Belle
• Isabella
• Annabelle
• Eva
• Ariel
• Ariana
• Ava
• Arabella
• Ella
• Elsa
• Annabella
• Angelina
• Emily
• Ellie
• Alana
• Arianna
• Lola
• April
• Anna
• Autumn

Famous People Named Bella

• Bella Milagro the daughter of Josiah & Lauren Duggar, from TLC's "Counting On"
• Bella Abzug U.S. Congresswoman from New York
• Bella Freud English fashion designer
• Bella Pilar American illustrator
• Isabella Khair "Bella" Hadid American model
• Annabella Avery "Bella" Thorne American actress
• Arwen Arabella "Bella" Hardy English folk singer
• Isabella "Bella" Heathcote Australian actress
• Bella Becker birth name of Belle Baker, American singer and actress
• Bella Lewitzky American choreographer
• Bella Rosenfeld Chagall Belarusian novelist; wife of painter Marc Chagall
• Bella Cohen Spewack American playwright and screenwriter
• Isabella "Bella" Loggins daughter of singer Kenny Loggins
• Isabella Jane "Bella" Cruise daughter of actors Tom Cruise and Nicole Kidman
• Isabella "Bella" Giannulli daughter of actress Lori Loughlin and designer Mossimo Giannulli
• Isabella 'Bella' Wallington daughter of actress Tina Hobley and Steve Wallington
• Bella Ivory Aziza Wayans daughter of actors Keenen Ivory and Daphne Wayans
• Bella Zahra Murphy daughter of actor Eddie Murphy
• Bella Thornton daughter of actor Billy Bob Thornton and Connie Angland
• Bella Noche Ruffalo (b. 2005) daughter of actor Mark Ruffalo
• Bella Blu Ray (b. 2008) daughter of bodybuilder Shawn Ray
• Bella Vita Bardot Boreanaz (b. 2009) daughter of actor David Boreanaz
• Bella Rose Lambert (b. 2013) daughter of footballer Rickie Lambert
• Bella Monroe James (b. 2012) daughter of rapper Juelz Santana and model Kimbella
• Bella Tatum Poor (b. 2013) daughter of skater Naomi Nari Nam and Tyler Poor
• Bella Meskhi (b. 2015) daughter of actors Ekaterina Klimova and Gela Meskhi
• Bella Raine Jeter (b. 2017) daughter of baseball player Derek Jeter
• Luca Bella Facinelli daughter of actors Jennie Garth and Peter Facinelli
• Kaiya Bella Luna Stormare (b. 2009) daughter of actor Peter Stormare
• Cai Bella Bridges (b. 2011) daughter of rapper Ludacris

Bella in Pop Culture

• Isabella Marie "Bella" Swan main character in the Twilight Saga
• Bellatrix "Bella" Lestrange character in the Harry Potter series
• Bella Monroe character in the video game Siren: Blood Curse
• Bella character in play "Lost in Yonkers" by Neil Simon
• Bella character on TV's "Young Americans"
• Isabella "Bella" Hartley mermaid on TV series "H2O: Just Add Water"
• Bella Goth (nee Bachelor) character in "The Sims" (1,4) video/computer games
• Isabella Jane "Bella" Cooper character on New Zealand soap "Shortland Street"
• Bella of Brockhall badger character in the Redwall series
• Bella Dawson main character on TV's "Bella and the Bulldogs"
• Bella Sharpe character on British soap "Hollyoaks"
• Bella Moriarty Spellgrove character in "Sherlock Holmes: The Musical"
• Bella minor character in the Game of Thrones series
• Bella Rose King character on Australian soap "Home and Away"
• Bella character in the Warriors series
• Bella Crossley character on TV's "Evermoor"
• Bella character in Erin Hunter's "Survivors" book series
• Bella Donna Boudreaux character in Marvel's X,Men comics