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Esabella vs Esai

American parents have registered 2,478 Esais since 1880, against 730 Esabellas. Esai is still ahead, with 107 babies in 2025.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

Births per year: Esabella against Esai, 1880 to 2025 0 30 60 90 120 1880 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020

Esabella Esai

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

Esai has been the commoner name in every year either was published, 1987 to 2025. The lead has never changed hands.

The closest they came was 2010, when Esabella had 44 and Esai had 63.

Side by side

  Esabella Esai
Total US births 7302,478
Most in one year 45119
Babies in 2025 16107
Estimated living today 7202,400
Median age today 1316
Peak year 20122024
Best rank 3,523rd girls1,503rd boys
Rank in 2025 6,838th1,585th
First recorded 19981987
Girls / boys 730 / 00 / 2,478

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 Esais alive today are over 16; half the Esabellas are over 13. 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: Esabella and Esai.