Safari
Safari is given to both girls and boys: 12 girls and 9 boys were given it in 2025 (#8,772 among girls’ names and #8,783 among boys’, #10,208 among all names counting both); 507 Americans have been recorded with it since 1992 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Safari by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Safari?
#8,772 among girls’ names, 2025
Safari fell from #5,799 in 2015 to #8,772 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born fell from 12.9 to 7.5 per million.
43 babies in 2023, the peak
Safari peaked in 2023, when 43 babies were given it (19 girls, #6,365 among girls’ names). The 21 births of 2025 (girls and boys) are 49% of that peak.
Births by sex.
| Year | Girls | Girls’ rank | Boys | Boys’ rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 12 | #8,772 | 9 | #8,783 |
| 2024 | 14 | #7,886 | 12 | #7,184 |
| 2023 | 19 | #6,365 | 24 | #4,436 |
| 2022 | 27 | #4,999 | 15 | #6,086 |
| 2021 | 15 | #7,569 | 10 | #8,050 |
| 2020 | 14 | #7,886 | 11 | #7,400 |
| 2019 | 11 | #9,628 | 7 | #10,596 |
| 2018 | 15 | #7,699 | 18 | #5,271 |
| 2017 | 17 | #7,041 | 15 | #6,015 |
| 2016 | 15 | #7,916 | 12 | #7,059 |
Every recorded year (30)
| Year | Girls | Girls’ rank | Boys | Boys’ rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 23 | #5,799 | under 5 | |
| 2014 | 16 | #7,576 | 5 | #13,688 |
| 2013 | 12 | #9,506 | under 5 | |
| 2012 | 8 | #13,231 | under 5 | |
| 2011 | 17 | #7,361 | under 5 | |
| 2010 | 10 | #11,092 | under 5 | |
| 2009 | 6 | #16,876 | under 5 | |
| 2008 | 21 | #6,521 | under 5 | |
| 2005 | 5 | #18,617 | under 5 | |
| 2003 | 5 | #17,849 | under 5 | |
| 2001 | 7 | #13,191 | under 5 | |
| 2000 | 8 | #11,566 | under 5 | |
| 1999 | 13 | #7,619 | under 5 | |
| 1998 | 9 | #9,930 | under 5 | |
| 1997 | 5 | #15,615 | under 5 | |
| 1996 | 6 | #13,116 | under 5 | |
| 1995 | 11 | #7,954 | under 5 | |
| 1994 | 9 | #9,437 | under 5 | |
| 1993 | 12 | #7,372 | under 5 | |
| 1992 | 7 | #11,432 | under 5 |
Ranks: girls’ names and boys’ names ranked separately in each year’s SSA file; “under 5” is a year SSA did not list the name for that sex.
Is Safari a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 507 Americans recorded as Safari, 73% are girls and 27% boys.
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Safari: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Safari, and how old are they?
An estimated 503 Americans named Safari and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 9 years old and half are between 4 and 16. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 416 people named Safari (254 women and girls, 162 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 328 born in the U.S. The Census count is 27% above that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
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).
Names spelled alike
Of these 3 names spelled alike, given to 925 babies since 1880, Safari is the most given (55% of them). In 2025 it was given to 21 of their 51 babies (41%), the second 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 Safari
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 Safari and names like it
- Compare Safari and SafiraBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2020sSafari peaked in 2023.
- Florida’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Safari since 1910.
- The top names of 2023The year the most babies were named Safari.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Safari alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with SMost given first.