From Arabic, meaning "sand" or "sandy place," and also used as a place name.
Ramla is a name of Arabic origin borne with particular distinction in early Islamic history. The most celebrated bearer is Ramla bint Abi Sufyan, also known as Umm Habiba, one of the wives of the Prophet Muhammad and a figure of remarkable personal courage. Born into the powerful Quraysh clan — her father Abu Sufyan was initially one of Islam's fiercest opponents — she converted to Islam and endured exile in Abyssinia, the death of her first husband, and years of separation from her family before her marriage to the Prophet.
Her story is one of conviction sustained against formidable social pressure, and she is revered in Muslim tradition as one of the Mothers of the Believers. The name itself is thought to derive from the Arabic root relating to sand (*raml*), evoking the desert landscape of the Arabian Peninsula, with a secondary folk association with the ability to read the future through sand divination — a practice once common in the region. Ramla is also the name of an ancient city in present-day Israel, founded in the early eighth century CE and serving for a time as the capital of the Umayyad province of Palestina Prima.
The name thus carries both personal and geographic historical weight. Today Ramla is most commonly given in East African Muslim communities — particularly in Somalia, Kenya, and the Swahili coast — as well as in Arab countries and the broader Muslim world. It has crossed into diaspora communities in Europe and North America, where its clean two-syllable structure and its distinguished Islamic historical associations make it a meaningful choice. The name's relative rarity outside these communities gives daughters named Ramla a name that is historically rich without being overexposed.