Kaliyah
Kaliyah was given to 791 girls in 2025, #392 among girls’ names; 12,951 Americans have been recorded with it since 1994 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 12,900 Americans named Kaliyah and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 12 years old and half are between 6 and 18.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Kaliyah by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Kaliyah mean?
Wiktionary, English section
Kaliyah is “a female given name.”
Meaning: Wiktionary, English section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Kaliyah?
#392 among girls’ names, 2025
Kaliyah rose from #543 in 2015 to #392 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born rose from 0.32 to 0.49 per 1,000.
791 babies in 2025, the peak
Kaliyah peaked in 2025, when 791 girls were given it, #392 among girls’ names. In 2024 it went to 705 girls.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 791 | #392 | 0.49 |
| 2024 | 705 | #442 | 0.44 |
| 2023 | 596 | #508 | 0.37 |
| 2022 | 498 | #602 | 0.30 |
| 2021 | 550 | #558 | 0.34 |
| 2020 | 522 | #564 | 0.32 |
| 2019 | 548 | #555 | 0.33 |
| 2018 | 589 | #534 | 0.35 |
| 2017 | 506 | #592 | 0.29 |
| 2016 | 501 | #601 | 0.28 |
Every recorded year (32)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per 1,000 girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 576 | #543 | 0.32 |
| 2014 | 565 | #548 | 0.32 |
| 2013 | 577 | #516 | 0.33 |
| 2012 | 562 | #537 | 0.32 |
| 2011 | 538 | #542 | 0.31 |
| 2010 | 511 | #572 | 0.29 |
| 2009 | 503 | #600 | 0.27 |
| 2008 | 491 | #628 | 0.26 |
| 2007 | 421 | #691 | 0.22 |
| 2006 | 365 | #754 | 0.19 |
| 2005 | 303 | #837 | 0.16 |
| 2004 | 361 | #732 | 0.20 |
| 2003 | 321 | #773 | 0.18 |
| 2002 | 301 | #781 | 0.17 |
| 2001 | 244 | #921 | 0.14 |
| 2000 | 110 | #1,607 | 0.06 |
| 1999 | 70 | #2,160 | 0.04 |
| 1998 | 70 | #2,090 | 0.04 |
| 1997 | 108 | #1,506 | 0.06 |
| 1996 | 51 | #2,485 | 0.03 |
| 1995 | 59 | #2,258 | 0.03 |
| 1994 | 33 | #3,391 | 0.02 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Kaliyah a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Kaliyah has been given almost only to girls: 5 boys in 32 years of records.
Girls and boys named Kaliyah: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Kaliyah, and how old are they?
12,900 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 12,951 Americans ever recorded as Kaliyah. The median Kaliyah alive today is 12 years old; half are between 6 and 18.
The 2020 Census counted 6,843 people named Kaliyah (6,826 women and girls, 17 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 9,353 born in the U.S. The Census count is 27% below that prediction. Possible reasons: people who give a short form or another name to the Census, and a survival estimate that can run high.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 140 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 5,230 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 7,480 |
An estimate, not a count. SSA’s files count people born in the United States who received a Social Security number, so anyone born abroad is not in them; before 1937 most people got a number as adults, and their survival is counted from that age.
Living estimate: SSA births carried forward with the survival rates in SSA’s cohort life tables (2024 Trustees Report) for each birth year and sex. How the estimate is made. Count: Census Bureau, first names in the 2020 Census (released April 14, 2026; names reported 100 or more times, with the Bureau’s disclosure-avoidance adjustment).
Where are babies named Kaliyah born?
The states with the most babies named Kaliyah are Texas, Florida and California, with 31% of its births recorded by state in 2025.
| State | Births 2025 | Rank, girls | vs. national |
|---|---|---|---|
| Texas | 92 | #375 | 0.9× |
| Florida | 80 | #238 | 1.5× |
| California | 65 | #513 | 0.7× |
| New York | 39 | #446 | 0.7× |
| North Carolina | 34 | #325 | 1.4× |
| Tennessee | 34 | #235 | 1.5× |
| Georgia | 32 | #343 | 1.6× |
| Ohio | 26 | #438 | 1.0× |
| Indiana | 25 | #284 | 1.0× |
| South Carolina | 24 | #203 | 1.8× |
Where Kaliyah is more common than its national share predicts
Relative to its national share, Kaliyah is most over-represented in Mississippi: since 1994 it was given 2.7 times as often there as its national share each year would predict.
States: SSA state file, 1910-2025, published May 8, 2026; births count girls and boys together, and the rank is among girls’ names in the state in 2025. The file leaves out any state and year with fewer than 5 babies of the name, so small states are undercounted; each ratio compares the state’s births of Kaliyah with the births its national share predicts year by year, for states with at least 100 births of the name.
Names spelled alike
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 33,537 babies since 1880, Kaliyah is the most given (39% of them). In 2025 it was given to 791 of their 1,484 babies (53%), again the most given.
Spelled alike: names in the SSA national file with the same pattern of letters and sounds and at most two letters apart, and Wiktionary’s listed forms; births since 1880 and in 2025, and each name’s peak year, from the SSA national file, published May 8, 2026. Some are separate names, not spellings of one.
Names that rose and fell in the same decades as Kaliyah
Names whose births rose and fell across the same decades, measured on each decade’s share of births.
Similar histories: each decade’s share of births, from the SSA national file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
More about Kaliyah and names like it
- Compare Kaliyah and KaliaBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2020sKaliyah peaked in 2025.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Kaliyah since 1910.
- The top names of 2025The year the most babies were named Kaliyah.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Kaliyah alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with KMost given first.