Kayah
Kayah was given to 22 girls in 2025, #5,638 among girls’ names; 512 Americans have been recorded with it since 1994 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Kayah by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Kayah?
#5,638 among girls’ names, 2025
Kayah fell from #4,658 in 2015 to #5,638 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 16.8 to 13.7 per million.
30 babies in 2007, the peak
Kayah peaked in 2007, when 30 girls were given it, #4,876 among girls’ names. The 22 births of 2025 are 73% of that peak.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 22 | #5,638 | 13.7 |
| 2024 | 16 | #7,081 | 9.9 |
| 2023 | 14 | #7,826 | 8.7 |
| 2022 | 16 | #7,122 | 9.8 |
| 2021 | 9 | #10,687 | 5.5 |
| 2020 | 19 | #6,195 | 11.8 |
| 2019 | 20 | #6,073 | 11.9 |
| 2018 | 21 | #5,893 | 12.3 |
| 2017 | 14 | #8,072 | 8.1 |
| 2016 | 23 | #5,710 | 13.0 |
Every recorded year (30)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 30 | #4,658 | 16.8 |
| 2014 | 16 | #7,476 | 9.0 |
| 2013 | 10 | #10,618 | 5.7 |
| 2012 | 25 | #5,475 | 14.2 |
| 2011 | 24 | #5,637 | 13.6 |
| 2010 | 18 | #7,058 | 10.1 |
| 2009 | 20 | #6,684 | 10.9 |
| 2008 | 17 | #7,572 | 9.0 |
| 2007 | 30 | #4,876 | 15.6 |
| 2006 | 19 | #6,713 | 10.0 |
| 2005 | 20 | #6,127 | 10.8 |
| 2004 | 18 | #6,624 | 9.8 |
| 2003 | 13 | #8,242 | 7.1 |
| 2002 | 18 | #6,261 | 10.0 |
| 2001 | 26 | #4,616 | 14.4 |
| 2000 | 5 | #16,264 | 2.8 |
| 1999 | 11 | #8,504 | 6.2 |
| 1998 | 5 | #15,308 | 2.8 |
| 1997 | 8 | #10,269 | 4.6 |
| 1994 | 5 | #14,496 | 2.8 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Kayah a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Kayah has been recorded only for girls: SSA lists no boys with the name in 30 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Kayah: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Kayah, and how old are they?
An estimated 508 Americans named Kayah and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 15 years old and half are between 8 and 21. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 457 people named Kayah (446 women and girls, 11 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 418 born in the U.S. The Census count is 9% above that prediction.
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).
How common is the spelling Kayah?
Kayah is a less common spelling of Kaia: SSA has recorded 512 Kayah and 20,967 Kaia since 1880.
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 160,229 babies since 1880, Kayah is the eighth most given (<1% of them). In 2025 it was given to 22 of their 2,241 babies (<1%), the sixth most given that year.
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 Kayah
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 Kayah and names like it
- Compare Kayah and KaiaBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2000sKayah peaked in 2007.
- California’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Kayah since 1910.
- The top names of 2007The year the most babies were named Kayah.
- The names of Generation ZMost people named Kayah alive today were born 1997-2012.
- Names starting with KMost given first.