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Anijah vs Aniyah

American parents have registered 31,212 Aniyahs since 1880, against 1,392 Anijahs. Aniyah is still ahead, with 618 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Anijah against Aniyah, 1880 to 2025 0 500 1k 1.5k 2k 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Anijah Aniyah

Each line is every baby given the name that year, girls and boys added together — the only count that means the same thing for both names. A line breaks where the name fell below five babies in a year — the point at which the SSA stops publishing it — rather than being drawn through a figure nobody published. A single published year in a gap shows as a dot.

Who was ahead

Aniyah has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1991 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 1994, when Anijah had 6 and Aniyah had 22.

Side by side

  Anijah Aniyah
Total US births 1,39231,212
Most in one year 1041,825
Babies in 2025 17618
Estimated living today 1,40031,000
Median age today 1714
Peak year 20102009
Best rank 1,928th girls181st girls
Rank in 2025 6,546th485th
First recorded 19941991
Girls / boys 1,392 / 031,207 / 5

A rank is a position within one sex’s list for one year, so the two rank rows are not subtracted from one another and the winning column is not marked on them. The living figure is a life-table estimate, not a count.

Which name is older

Half of the Anijahs alive today are over 17; half the Aniyahs are over 14. That is 3 years between them: two names in use at the same time, worn by two different generations.

Where each one is strongest

How much commoner the name is in that state than it is nationally, from births recorded since 1910.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

Social Security Administration birth records, 1880–2025, public domain. Full histories: Anijah and Aniyah.