Leilani
Meaning of Leilani
Leilani (lay-LAH-nee) glides from the lips like trade-wind breath through palm crowns, a Hawaiian phrase meaning “heavenly garland,” yet her cadence also echoes the tranquil hush of a Kyoto temple garden where falling cherry petals stipple a pond watched over by patient koi. Born from the lei—those braided circles of plumeria and pikake offered in greeting—and lifted by lani, the word for sky, the name wreathes the wearer in both blossom and altitude, suggesting a spirit simultaneously earth-scented and star-lit. Cool in poise, she evokes the pale flutter of a crane against twilight indigo, a single silk brushstroke on shibori cloth, serene while quietly vibrant. Across a century of American birth ledgers she has ascended like a moon on an unhurried tide, cresting into today’s top hundred as parents seek syllables that feel at once island-warm and breeze-light. To choose Leilani is to bestow a portable archipelago of calm, a fragrant crown woven from sky and flower that will sway with each footstep and remind its bearer—wherever the winds may carry her—of paradise ever within reach.
Pronunciation
Hawaiian
- Pronunced as lay-LAH-nee (/leɪ.ˈlɑ.ni/)
U.S. Popularity Chart
States Popularity Chart
Notable People Named Leilani
| Leilani Münter - Leilani Maaja Munter is an American former professional stock car racing driver and environmental activist who last competed in the ARCA Menards Series after earlier driving in Firestone Indy Lights, the development league for IndyCar. |
| Leilani Muir was the first to win a wrongful sterilization suit against Alberta, spurring more cases and spotlighting eugenics, institutionalization, disability rights, and self advocacy. |
| Leilani Mitchell is an American and Australian basketball player for the Southside Flyers and the Australian national team, drafted 25th by the Phoenix Mercury in 2008, and in 2019 became the first to win the WNBA Most Improved Player Award twice. |
| An English former Miss Great Britain and Page 3 model, Leilani Dowding later appeared on reality TV and became a conservative commentator and anti mRNA vaccine campaigner. |
| Leilani Perese is a New Zealand rugby union player who debuted for the Black Ferns in 2018 and plays for Hurricanes Poua and Counties Manukau. |
| Leilani McGonagle is a Costa Rican professional surfer who competes in the World Surf League, and her brother Noe Mar McGonagle is also a professional surfer. |
| Leilani Read was a New Zealand and Samoan netball international who played nine times for New Zealand, suffered from a rare blood disorder, and died at 25 from a brain haemorrhage. |
