Jamale
A masculine name of Arabic origin meaning "beauty" or "beautiful".
Name Census estimates that about 479 living Americans carry the first name Jamale. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Jamale today is around 33 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Jamale births was 1989 (27 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Jamale. 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.
People living today
479
~ 1 in 715,562 Americans
Peak year
1989
27 babies that year
Average age
33
years old
2020 SSA rank
#8,338
Tracked since 1972
Census
Jamale in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 379 people with the first name Jamale, which placed it at #25,119 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
#25,119
National first-name rank
People counted
379
379 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
89.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Jamale
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jamale is Black at 89.7%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (5.5%) and White (3.4%). 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 Jamale 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 Jamale at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American89.7% · 340
- Two or more races5.5% · 21
- White3.4% · 13
- Hispanic or Latino1.3% · 5
Popularity
Jamale: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Jamale from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1980s, with 182 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1980s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Jamale 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 Jamale during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Jamales live
Origin
Meaning and history of Jamale
The name Jamale has its origins in Arabic culture and language. It is a variant spelling of the Arabic name Jamal, derived from the word "jamal" which means "beauty" or "perfection". The name Jamale is believed to have emerged in the Middle Ages, around the 7th century AD, during the rise of Islamic civilization.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Jamale can be found in medieval Arabic literature and poetry. Jamale was the name of a renowned Andalusian poet and scholar who lived in the 11th century in present-day Spain. His full name was Jamale al-Din Ibn al-Khatib, and he was widely respected for his literary works and contributions to the field of linguistics.
In the 13th century, a famous Sufi mystic and saint from Persia was known as Jamale al-Din al-Sawi. He was revered for his spiritual teachings and is said to have influenced the development of Islamic mysticism in the region.
During the Ottoman Empire, which ruled over much of the Middle East and parts of Europe from the 14th to the 20th centuries, the name Jamale was relatively common among the nobility and elite classes. One notable figure was Jamale Pasha, a high-ranking Ottoman military commander who lived in the late 16th century and played a significant role in the Ottoman-Safavid Wars.
In the 19th century, Jamale Eddine al-Afghani was an influential Islamic philosopher and political activist who advocated for pan-Islamic unity and reform. He was born in Afghanistan in 1838 and traveled extensively throughout the Middle East and Europe, spreading his ideas and calling for a revitalization of Islamic thought and society.
Another notable figure with the name Jamale was Jamale Khashoggi, a Saudi Arabian journalist and dissident who was assassinated in 2018. He was a prominent critic of the Saudi government and advocated for freedom of speech and human rights in the region.
While the name Jamale has Arabic roots, it has been adopted and used in various cultures and communities around the world, particularly among Muslim populations. However, its primary association remains with the Arabic language and Islamic heritage.
People
Jamale + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Jamale as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with J
Other first names starting with J with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Jamale: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Jamale?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 479 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Jamale 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 715,562 US residents.
Is Jamale a common name?
We classify Jamale as "Very Rare". It ranks above 84.2% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 495 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Jamale most popular?
The single biggest year for Jamale was 1989, when 27 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Jamale is about 33 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Jamale in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 379 people with the name Jamale, or 0.13 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #25,119 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 Jamale 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 Jamale?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jamale leans strongly male. 362 people counted with this name were male (94.3%), compared with 22 female bearers (5.7%). 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 Jamale?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jamale is Black at 89.7%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (5.5%) and White (3.4%). 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 Jamale most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Jamale in the 2020 Census, accounting for 89.7% (340 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 Jamale in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Jamale a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Jamale in the SSA data are male. 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 Jamale still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Jamale 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 Jamale 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 many Americans are named Jamale?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.