Amariah
A feminine name of Hebrew origin meaning "the Lord has promised".
Name Census estimates that about 3,543 living Americans carry the first name Amariah. It is a predominantly female name (99.4% of registrations). The average person named Amariah today is around 14 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Amariah births was 2024 (185 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Amariah. Below you will find a gender breakdown showing how the name splits between male and female registrations, a year-by-year popularity chart stretching back to 1880, decade-level totals, the top US states for this name, its meaning and etymology, and a set of frequently asked questions with data-backed answers.
For a British comparison, Name Census UK has a UK baby-name profile for Amariah with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Amariah is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 14 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
3.5K
~ 1 in 96,741 Americans
Peak year
2024
185 babies that year
Average age
14
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,289
Tracked since 1980
Census
Amariah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,309 people with the first name Amariah, which placed it at #6,822 in the published first-name tables. This is a snapshot of people who already had the name at the time of the Census.
The SSA sections elsewhere on this page answer a different question: how often parents gave the name to babies over time. The "people living today" figure on this page is different again: it is a current estimate built from SSA birth records and age-based survival rates, so the two numbers are not expected to match exactly.
2020 Census rank
#6,822
National first-name rank
People counted
2.3K
2,309 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.8
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
46.2% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Amariah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Amariah is Black at 46.2%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (22.5%) and White (18.1%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself.
The bar chart below shows how people with the first name Amariah described their own race and ethnicity on the 2020 Census form. The Census Bureau groups responses into six broad categories: White, Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, Asian and Pacific Islander, American Indian and Alaska Native, and Two or More Races. When a category has too few respondents for a given name, the Bureau suppresses the figure to protect individual privacy, which is why some names show fewer than six slices.
Percentages are shown so the breakdown is easy to read across every published category. Because the 2020 Census first-name file also includes raw headcounts for each group, Name Census can show those alongside the percentages in the legend and hover tooltip.
Keep in mind that these are self-reported numbers. A first name does not determine a person's race or ethnicity, and the distribution you see here reflects the specific population who happened to carry the name Amariah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American46.2% · 1,067
- Hispanic or Latino22.5% · 520
- White18.1% · 419
- Two or more races10.2% · 235
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.9% · 45
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.0% · 23
Gender
Gender distribution for Amariah
Out of the 3,581 babies given the name Amariah since 1880, 99.4% were registered as female. The name sits firmly on the female side of the spectrum, with only a handful of male registrations across the entire dataset.
Amariah as a male name
- Ranked #10,979 in 2024
- 6 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2020 (7 births)
Amariah as a female name
- Ranked #1,289 in 2024
- 179 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2009 (181 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Amariah leans strongly female. 2,253 people counted with this name were female (97.4%), compared with 61 male bearers (2.6%).
Popularity
Amariah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Amariah from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 1,498 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Amariah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Amariah by decade
The table below breaks the full SSA timeline into ten-year windows. Each row shows how many male and female babies were given the name Amariah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Amariahs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 29 states and territories. Texas, California, Florida recorded the most babies named Amariah, while Wisconsin, Oklahoma, Arkansas recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 72 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Amariah
The name Amariah has its origins in Hebrew, where it is derived from the combination of two words: "Amar" meaning "to say" or "to speak," and "Yah," a shortened form of the name of the Hebrew God, Yahweh. The name Amariah translates to "the Lord has spoken" or "the Lord has promised."
This name can be traced back to ancient Israelite culture and is found in religious texts such as the Bible. In the Old Testament, Amariah is mentioned as the name of several individuals, including a chief priest during the reign of King Jehoshaphat in the 9th century BCE, and a Levite who assisted in the reforms of King Hezekiah in the 8th century BCE.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Amariah dates back to around the 6th century BCE, when it was borne by a silversmith mentioned in the Book of Ezra in the Bible. Throughout history, several notable figures have carried the name Amariah.
One such figure was Amariah ben Yitzchak, a Jewish scholar and philosopher who lived in the 13th century CE in Provence, France. He was known for his work on the Talmud and Jewish law.
Another notable Amariah was Amariah ben Elijah of Tizra, a 16th-century Karaite Jewish scholar and author who wrote extensively on Karaite theology and philosophy.
In the 17th century, Amariah ben David of Modena was a renowned Italian rabbi and scholar known for his expertise in Jewish law and his contributions to the study of Kabbalah.
Amariah Harris (1768-1851), an American minister and educator, was a prominent figure in the early days of the United States. He served as the president of the Baptist College of Rhode Island (later known as Brown University) from 1826 to 1836.
Finally, Amariah Brigham (1798-1849) was an American author and educator who served as the first superintendent of the New York State Common School system, playing a significant role in the development of public education in the United States.
These are just a few examples of individuals throughout history who have borne the name Amariah, a name with deep roots in ancient Hebrew culture and religious significance.
People
Amariah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Amariah as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Amariah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Amariah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 3,543 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Amariah going back to 1880 and adjusting each cohort for expected survival using CDC actuarial life tables. The result is an age-weighted living-bearer count, not a raw birth total. That works out to about 1 in 96,741 US residents.
Is Amariah a common name?
We classify Amariah as "Rare". It ranks above 95.7% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 3,581 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Amariah most popular?
The single biggest year for Amariah was 2024, when 185 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Amariah is about 14 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Amariah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,309 people with the name Amariah, or 0.76 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #6,822 in the national Census ranking for first names.
Why is the Census count different from the living estimate?
Because they measure different things. The Census figure is a count of people who had the name Amariah in 2020. The living estimate aims to answer a current question instead: how many people with the name are alive today, based on SSA birth records and age-based survival rates. Since one number is a 2020 snapshot and the other is a present-day estimate, they are not expected to be identical.
What does the Census say about the gender split for Amariah?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Amariah leans strongly female. 2,253 people counted with this name were female (97.4%), compared with 61 male bearers (2.6%). The Census view is a snapshot of people living with the name in 2020, while the SSA section above tracks births across time.
What does the Census say about the background of people named Amariah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Amariah is Black at 46.2%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (22.5%) and White (18.1%). These figures describe the people who had the name in 2020, not any inherent property of the name itself. The percentages in the chart above come from self-reported race and Hispanic-origin responses in the 2020 Census.
Which group reports the name Amariah most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Amariah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 46.2% (1,067 people in the published table).
Why can the Census sex total and race total differ slightly?
The Census Bureau published separate 2020 tables for sex and for race/Hispanic origin, and the released figures can differ slightly because of privacy protection in the public files. That is why this page treats the gender section and the race/origin section as two related snapshots instead of forcing them into one identical total.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only includes names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files have no Census demographic snapshot. When that happens, the SSA trend, gender history, and state sections still appear, but the 2020 Census demographic sections are omitted.
What does the SSA popularity chart show?
The chart tracks births, not the number of people alive with the name today. Each point shows how many babies were given the name Amariah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Amariah a female name?
Yes, 99.4% of people registered as Amariah in the SSA data are female. You can see the full per-sex comparison in the gender distribution section above, which includes the latest year rank, birth count, and peak year for each sex.
Is Amariah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Amariah in 2024, and the page above shows its latest-year rank where available. A name can be well past its peak and still remain in steady use, especially if it built up a large population over earlier decades.
Why can a name have a lot of living bearers even if it is not trendy now?
Because living-bearer counts and current baby-name popularity measure different things. A name like Amariah can build up a very large population over many decades, even if fewer parents are choosing it now than they did at its peak.
Where does this data come from?
First-name figures come from the Social Security Administration's national baby name files, which cover every name on a birth certificate from 1880 to 2024. Living-bearer estimates layer in CDC actuarial life tables broken out by sex to account for mortality. The population baseline (342,754,338) is the Census Bureau's latest national estimate. You can read the full calculation on our methodology page.
How common is the name Amariah?
For a quick modern take, check how many people have the name Amariah on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.