Shem Tov UnisexIn Israel: hardly given today
ShovayIn Hebrew: שבי · meaning, pronunciation and popularity in Israel
Romanization: shováy
Shovay (Hebrew: שבי) is a unisex name. 161 people born in Israel between 1949 and 2024 have it today, according to Israel's Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). Its peak year was 1962, with 5 babies.
- People in Israel
- 161
- born 1949–2024
- Babies in 2024
- —
- not in the list
- Peak year
- 1962
- 5 babies
- USA
- —
- not in the SSA list
Writing and saying Shovay
In Hebrew letters the name is שבי, read right to left. Shovay is the Latin spelling recorded in Wiktionary; families choose their own spelling in passports, so you may also meet other forms. Wiktionary romanizes it as "shováy" (the accent marks the stressed syllable).
Meaning and origin
- a male given name
Quoted from English Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0), unchanged.
Shovay by year in Israel
How many boys out of every 10,000 born each year have the name. For Israel it counts the people born that year who carry the name today (the CBS counts residents by year of birth, not birth registrations).
per 10,000 babies of the same sex
Questions about Shovay
How do you write Shovay in Hebrew?
Shovay is written שבי in Hebrew. Hebrew is read right to left. A dictionary romanization is "shováy".
How many people in Israel are named Shovay?
161 people born between 1949 and 2024 carry the name שבי: 70 women and 91 men. The count comes from the CBS table of current first names by year of birth; years with fewer than 5 people are not published.
Is Shovay a boy's or a girl's name?
Both. In Israel 43% of the people named שבי are women and 57% are men, so we count it as unisex (our threshold: at least 20% of the less common sex).
What does the name Shovay mean?
English Wiktionary describes it as: "a male given name"
Sources
Israel: Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS), current first names of people born 1949–2024 by sex, population group and year of birth, processed 2026-09-27. CBS publications.