Humanverse

Muhammadali vs Muhammed

American parents have registered 2,600 Muhammeds since 1880, against 739 Muhammadalis. But in 2025 it was Muhammadali that was commoner, 89 babies to 67.

Babies given each name, 1880–2025

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

Muhammadali Muhammed

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

Of the 54 years in which either name was published, Muhammed for 49 years and Muhammadali for 5 years. The lead changed hands once.

Side by side

  Muhammadali Muhammed
Total US births 7392,600
Most in one year 120106
Babies in 2025 8967
Estimated living today 7402,600
Median age today 315
Peak year 20242014
Best rank 1,494th boys1,514th boys
Rank in 2025 1,793rd2,145th
First recorded 20061970
Girls / boys 0 / 7390 / 2,600

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 Muhammeds alive today are over 15; half the Muhammadalis are over 3. That is 12 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.

Both names abroad

Countries whose statistics office publishes both names, so the comparison can be made somewhere other than the United States.

Country Muhammadali Muhammed
England and Wales 2111,912
Ireland 6 Muhammad Ali62
Poland 6 Muhammad Ali15

Every spelling a country files separately is added together, over whatever years that country publishes — which is not the same range in any two of them, so read the columns against each other and not the rows.

Compare something else

Related comparisons

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