Jesiah
A masculine name of Hebrew origin meaning "Yahweh will lend".
Name Census estimates that about 4,817 living Americans carry the first name Jesiah. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 84.6% of registrations being male. The average person named Jesiah today is around 11 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Jesiah births was 2024 (354 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Jesiah. 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 Jesiah with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Jesiah is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 11 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
4.8K
~ 1 in 71,155 Americans
Peak year
2024
354 babies that year
Average age
11
years old
2024 SSA rank
#805
Tracked since 1976
Census
Jesiah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,533 people with the first name Jesiah, which placed it at #6,364 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
#6,364
National first-name rank
People counted
2.5K
2,533 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.8
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Hispanic or Latino
42.1% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Jesiah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jesiah is Hispanic at 42.1%. The next largest groups are Black (31.2%) and White (15.5%). 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 Jesiah 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 Jesiah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Hispanic or Latino42.1% · 1,066
- Black or African American31.2% · 790
- White15.5% · 392
- Two or more races8.8% · 223
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.3% · 33
- Asian and Pacific Islander1.1% · 29
Gender
Gender distribution for Jesiah
Jesiah leans heavily male at 84.6% of total registrations, but 747 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Jesiah as a male name
- Ranked #805 in 2024
- 312 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (312 births)
Jesiah as a female name
- Ranked #3,662 in 2024
- 42 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2017 (107 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jesiah leans strongly male. 2,232 people counted with this name were male (88.2%), compared with 298 female bearers (11.8%).
Popularity
Jesiah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Jesiah from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 2,239 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Jesiah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Jesiah 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 Jesiah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Jesiahs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 26 states and territories. Texas, California, Florida recorded the most babies named Jesiah, while South Carolina, New Mexico, Oregon recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 117 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Jesiah
The name Jesiah is of Hebrew origin and can be traced back to ancient times. It is derived from the Hebrew name Yeshayahu, which means "Yahweh is salvation" or "salvation of the Lord." This name is a variant of the more familiar name Isaiah, which is found in the Bible as the name of one of the major prophets in the Old Testament.
The name Jesiah was not widely used in ancient times, but it did appear in some historical records and documents from the Middle Ages. One of the earliest recorded instances of the name was in the 12th century, when a Jewish scholar named Jesiah ben Abraham lived in Spain. He was known for his work in the field of linguistics and Hebrew grammar.
In the 16th century, there was a notable figure named Jesiah West, who was an English clergyman and writer. He was born in 1566 and is known for his work titled "The Book of Martyrs," which documented the persecution of Protestants during the reign of Queen Mary I of England.
Another historical figure with the name Jesiah was Jesiah Conant, an American clergyman and educator who lived in the 18th century. He was born in 1670 and served as the third president of Harvard College from 1725 to 1727.
In the 19th century, there was a British artist named Jesiah Willock who was active in the early part of the century. He was known for his landscape paintings and was a member of the Royal Academy of Arts.
One of the more recent historical figures with the name Jesiah was Jesiah Tuka, a Fijian politician and chief who lived in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He played a significant role in the movement for Fijian independence and was involved in negotiations with the British colonial authorities.
While the name Jesiah has not been as common as some other biblical names, it has been used throughout history by various individuals from different cultures and backgrounds. Its Hebrew roots and connection to the prophet Isaiah have likely contributed to its enduring appeal and use over the centuries.
People
Jesiah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Jesiah 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
Jesiah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Jesiah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 4,817 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Jesiah 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 71,155 US residents.
Is Jesiah a common name?
We classify Jesiah as "Rare". It ranks above 96.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 4,859 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Jesiah most popular?
The single biggest year for Jesiah was 2024, when 354 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Jesiah is about 11 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Jesiah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,533 people with the name Jesiah, or 0.84 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #6,364 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 Jesiah 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 Jesiah?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Jesiah leans strongly male. 2,232 people counted with this name were male (88.2%), compared with 298 female bearers (11.8%). 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 Jesiah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Jesiah is Hispanic at 42.1%. The next largest groups are Black (31.2%) and White (15.5%). 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 Jesiah most often in the Census?
Hispanic is the largest reported group for people named Jesiah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 42.1% (1,066 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 Jesiah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Jesiah a male name?
Yes, 84.6% of people registered as Jesiah 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 Jesiah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Jesiah 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 Jesiah 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 people are called Jesiah?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.