Khadeja
Of Arabic origin, meaning "the premature or precocious one".
Name Census estimates that about 175 living Americans carry the first name Khadeja. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Khadeja today is around 30 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Khadeja births was 1994 (41 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Khadeja. 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 Khadeja with official rankings and popularity over time.
People living today
175
~ 1 in 1,958,596 Americans
Peak year
1994
41 babies that year
Average age
30
years old
2009 SSA rank
#16,262
Tracked since 1973
Census
Khadeja in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 277 people with the first name Khadeja, which placed it at #31,090 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
#31,090
National first-name rank
People counted
277
277 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
46.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Khadeja
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Khadeja is Black at 46.9%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (26.4%) and White (19.1%). 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 Khadeja 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 Khadeja at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American46.9% · 130
- Asian and Pacific Islander26.4% · 73
- White19.1% · 53
- Two or more races6.1% · 17
- Hispanic or Latino0.7% · 2
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.7% · 2
Popularity
Khadeja: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Khadeja from the 1970s through to the 2000s, spanning 4 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 1990s, with 113 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 1990s peak, Khadeja remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Khadeja 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 Khadeja during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Khadejas live
Origin
Meaning and history of Khadeja
The name Khadeja has its origins in the Arabic language and traces back to the 6th century CE in the Arabian Peninsula. It is derived from the Arabic root word "khadija," which means "the one who was born premature."
The name gained significant historical prominence as it was the name of Khadija bint Khuwaylid, the first wife of the Prophet Muhammad. She was a respected businesswoman in Mecca and was the first person to convert to Islam. Her life and her unwavering support for the Prophet Muhammad played a crucial role in the early days of Islam.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Khadeja can be found in the Quran, the central religious text of Islam, where Khadija bint Khuwaylid is mentioned. This has contributed to the name's widespread popularity among Muslims across the world.
Throughout history, several notable women have borne the name Khadeja. One such figure was Khadeja Terri (1853-1901), an African-American educator and activist who fought for the rights of African Americans and women's suffrage in the late 19th century.
Another prominent Khadeja was Khadeja Amatulla (1856-1953), a Bengali social reformer and educator who played a pivotal role in the education of Muslim women in British India. She established several schools for girls and worked tirelessly to promote female education.
In the 20th century, Khadeja Rachida Mastor (1920-2008) was a Moroccan activist and politician who fought for women's rights and gender equality. She served as the President of the Union Nationale des Femmes Marocaines (National Union of Moroccan Women) and played a significant role in the feminist movement in Morocco.
Khadeja Ismayilova (born 1976) is a contemporary Azerbaijani investigative journalist and human rights activist. She has been recognized for her courageous reporting on corruption and human rights violations in Azerbaijan, earning numerous international awards for her work.
Khadeja Bano (1932-2022) was a renowned Bangladeshi writer and activist who championed the cause of women's empowerment and social justice. Her literary works, including novels, short stories, and poems, dealt with themes of gender inequality, poverty, and the struggles of women in rural Bangladesh.
People
Khadeja + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Khadeja 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
Khadeja: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Khadeja?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 175 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Khadeja 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 1,958,596 US residents.
Is Khadeja a common name?
We classify Khadeja as "Very Rare". It ranks above 72.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 181 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Khadeja most popular?
The single biggest year for Khadeja was 1994, when 41 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Khadeja is about 30 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Khadeja in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 277 people with the name Khadeja, or 0.09 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #31,090 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 Khadeja 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 Khadeja?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Khadeja appears almost entirely female. Of the 281 people counted with this name, 99.6% were female and only a very small share were male. 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 Khadeja?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Khadeja is Black at 46.9%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (26.4%) and White (19.1%). 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 Khadeja most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Khadeja in the 2020 Census, accounting for 46.9% (130 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 Khadeja in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Khadeja a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Khadeja 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 Khadeja still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Khadeja 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 Khadeja 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 Khadeja as a first name?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.