Yoshua
Yoshua was given to 37 boys in 2025, #3,235 among boys’ names; 603 Americans have been recorded with it since 1984 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Yoshua by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Yoshua?
#3,235 among boys’ names, 2025
Yoshua rose from #5,732 in 2015 to #3,235 in 2025 among boys’ names; its share of boys born rose from 8.3 to 21.7 per million.
37 babies in 2025, the peak
Yoshua peaked in 2025, when 37 boys were given it, #3,235 among boys’ names. In 2024 it went to 31 boys.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 37 | #3,235 | 21.7 |
| 2024 | 31 | #3,687 | 18.0 |
| 2023 | 29 | #3,872 | 17.0 |
| 2022 | 31 | #3,686 | 17.8 |
| 2021 | 26 | #4,110 | 14.9 |
| 2020 | 15 | #5,963 | 8.7 |
| 2019 | 20 | #4,944 | 11.1 |
| 2018 | 14 | #6,329 | 7.7 |
| 2017 | 19 | #5,101 | 10.3 |
| 2016 | 20 | #4,934 | 10.5 |
Every recorded year (37)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million boys |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 16 | #5,732 | 8.3 |
| 2014 | 18 | #5,242 | 9.4 |
| 2013 | 16 | #5,647 | 8.5 |
| 2012 | 21 | #4,675 | 11.1 |
| 2011 | 18 | #5,193 | 9.5 |
| 2010 | 24 | #4,235 | 12.5 |
| 2009 | 18 | #5,321 | 9.1 |
| 2008 | 27 | #3,914 | 13.2 |
| 2007 | 23 | #4,365 | 11.1 |
| 2006 | 13 | #6,445 | 6.3 |
| 2005 | 13 | #6,205 | 6.5 |
| 2004 | 19 | #4,593 | 9.6 |
| 2003 | 12 | #6,239 | 6.1 |
| 2002 | 8 | #8,429 | 4.1 |
| 2001 | 11 | #6,429 | 5.7 |
| 2000 | 13 | #5,567 | 6.6 |
| 1999 | 5 | #11,568 | 2.6 |
| 1998 | 8 | #7,534 | 4.2 |
| 1997 | 5 | #10,783 | 2.7 |
| 1996 | 12 | #5,174 | 6.3 |
| 1995 | 12 | #5,111 | 6.3 |
| 1994 | 11 | #5,438 | 5.7 |
| 1993 | 6 | #8,679 | 3.1 |
| 1992 | 11 | #5,220 | 5.5 |
| 1991 | 5 | #9,623 | 2.5 |
| 1989 | 8 | #6,212 | 4.0 |
| 1984 | 8 | #4,962 | 4.4 |
Ranks and shares: boys’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all boys SSA recorded that year.
Is Yoshua a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Yoshua has been recorded only for boys: SSA lists no girls with the name in 37 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Yoshua: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Yoshua, and how old are they?
An estimated 595 Americans named Yoshua and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 14 years old and half are between 5 and 22. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 466 people named Yoshua (13 women and girls, 453 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 432 born in the U.S. The Census count is 8% 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).
Names spelled alike
Of these 8 names spelled alike, given to 8,070 babies since 1880, Yoshua is the fourth most given (7.5% of them). In 2025 it was given to 37 of their 398 babies (9.3%), the third 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 Yoshua
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 Yoshua and names like it
- Compare Yoshua and YeshuaBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2020sYoshua peaked in 2025.
- California’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Yoshua since 1910.
- The top names of 2025The year the most babies were named Yoshua.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Yoshua alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with YMost given first.