Zafira
Meaning
successful, victorious (from zafar, 'victory, triumph')
The story
Zafira is Arabic, from the root zafar, victory and triumph, so the name reads as successful, victorious, a meaning parents choose on purpose. It has a soft international sound that travels easily between Arabic, Urdu, and Malay-speaking communities, with spellings like Zafirah and Zaphira alongside. It is rare in US records since 1890, held mostly within Muslim families, which keeps it distinctive: a Z name with real meaning behind the flash. The sound does half the work here, that opening Z carrying confidence the way the meaning promises it, and the -ira ending landing gently alongside familiar favorites like Amira and Samira. Because several related spellings circulate, the page keeps its claim at the shared Arabic root instead of assigning one national route. Its confidence is linguistic before it is stylistic.
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Zafira has stayed rare in US records the whole time: no peak decade to name.
See popularity in Brazil
Popularity in Brazil
178 people · the #27,587 first name in Brazil · about 1 in 1,000,000 · median age 54
Among people named Zafira living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 2010s than in any other decade.
Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
The Zafira deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Zafira truly comes from, how it traveled, and what a century of records reveals. If you have grown a tree on nametree, it also considers how Zafira fits with your family’s names and surname.
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