Kenyetta
A feminine name of Kenyan origin meaning "she is great".
Name Census estimates that about 2,669 living Americans carry the first name Kenyetta. It is a predominantly female name (95.5% of registrations). The average person named Kenyetta today is around 43 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Kenyetta births was 1979 (126 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Kenyetta. 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.
Key insights
- • Although Kenyetta is used almost entirely for girls, the SSA data does show 128 boys registered with the name since 1880.
People living today
2.7K
~ 1 in 128,421 Americans
Peak year
1979
126 babies that year
Average age
43
years old
2007 SSA rank
#13,466
Tracked since 1963
Census
Kenyetta in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 2,175 people with the first name Kenyetta, which placed it at #7,105 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
#7,105
National first-name rank
People counted
2.2K
2,175 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.7
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
94.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Kenyetta
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Kenyetta is Black at 94.9%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (2.5%) and Hispanic (1.4%). 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 Kenyetta 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 Kenyetta at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American94.9% · 2,064
- Two or more races2.5% · 54
- Hispanic or Latino1.4% · 31
- White1.0% · 22
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.1% · 3
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.0% · 1
Gender
Gender distribution for Kenyetta
Kenyetta leans heavily female at 95.5% of total registrations, but 128 boys have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Kenyetta as a male name
- Ranked #13,466 in 2007
- 5 male births in 2007
- Peak: 1975 (14 births)
Kenyetta as a female name
- Ranked #14,257 in 2010
- 7 female births in 2010
- Peak: 1979 (113 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Kenyetta leans strongly female. 2,080 people counted with this name were female (96.0%), compared with 87 male bearers (4.0%).
Popularity
Kenyetta: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Kenyetta from the 1960s through to the 2010s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1970s, with 1,058 total registrations. Usage has dropped considerably from its 1970s peak. The most recent decade brought in only a fraction of the registrations that the name once attracted.
Babies born per year
Decades
Kenyetta 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 Kenyetta during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Kenyettas live
The SSA's state-level files cover 17 states and territories. Michigan, New York, Georgia recorded the most babies named Kenyetta, while Maryland, District of Columbia, Texas recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 92 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Kenyetta
The name Kenyetta is a variant spelling of the Kenyan name Kenji or Kenjetta. It is derived from the Kikuyu language spoken by the Bantu people of Kenya in East Africa. The name likely originated in the late 19th or early 20th century as European colonizers and Christian missionaries began recording and transcribing African names using the Latin alphabet.
The root word "keny" or "kenj" in Kikuyu means "born" or "birthed". It is often used as a prefix in names to signify the circumstances or location of a child's birth. The suffix "-etta" is a diminutive form, implying a small or endearing quality. So the name Kenyetta could be interpreted as "little one who is born" or "beloved newborn".
There are no known historical references to the name Kenyetta in ancient texts or religious scriptures. However, its Kikuyu roots suggest it has been used informally by the Kikuyu people for generations before being transcribed and adopted more widely.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Kenyetta is Kenyetta Kingsley, an African-American civil rights activist born in 1919 in Alabama, USA. She was a prominent leader in the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and participated in Freedom Rides to protest segregation in the American South.
Other notable individuals named Kenyetta throughout history include:
Kenyetta Tyre (born 1978), an American former professional basketball player in the WNBA.
Kenyetta Williams (born 1972), an American former track and field athlete who competed in the heptathlon.
Kenyetta Black (born 1984), an American former professional basketball player in the WNBA.
Kenyetta Jefferies (born 1981), a former professional tennis player from the Bahamas.
While the name Kenyetta is not extremely common, it has been used across various cultures and ethnicities, particularly in the United States, likely influenced by the Kenyan roots and the African-American civil rights movement.
People
Kenyetta + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Kenyetta as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with K
Other first names starting with K with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Kenyetta: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Kenyetta?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,669 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Kenyetta 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 128,421 US residents.
Is Kenyetta a common name?
We classify Kenyetta as "Rare". It ranks above 94.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,863 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Kenyetta most popular?
The single biggest year for Kenyetta was 1979, when 126 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Kenyetta is about 43 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Kenyetta in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 2,175 people with the name Kenyetta, or 0.72 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #7,105 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 Kenyetta 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 Kenyetta?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Kenyetta leans strongly female. 2,080 people counted with this name were female (96.0%), compared with 87 male bearers (4.0%). 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 Kenyetta?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Kenyetta is Black at 94.9%. The next largest groups are Two or More Races (2.5%) and Hispanic (1.4%). 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 Kenyetta most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Kenyetta in the 2020 Census, accounting for 94.9% (2,064 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 Kenyetta in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Kenyetta a female name?
Yes, 95.5% of people registered as Kenyetta 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 Kenyetta still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Kenyetta 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 Kenyetta 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 have Kenyetta as a first name?
For a quick modern take, check how many people have the name Kenyetta on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.