Alyjah
Variant spelling of the feminine name Aliyah, of Hebrew origin, meaning "ascent" or "rising."
Name Census estimates that about 379 living Americans carry the first name Alyjah. It appears on both sides of the gender split, with 86.9% of registrations being male. The average person named Alyjah today is around 16 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Alyjah births was 2008 (25 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Alyjah. 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.
People living today
379
~ 1 in 904,365 Americans
Peak year
2008
25 babies that year
Average age
16
years old
2024 SSA rank
#6,832
Tracked since 1997
Census
Alyjah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 297 people with the first name Alyjah, which placed it at #29,680 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
#29,680
National first-name rank
People counted
297
297 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
39.7% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Alyjah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Alyjah is Black at 39.7%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (24.6%) and Two or More Races (18.5%). 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 Alyjah 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 Alyjah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American39.7% · 118
- Hispanic or Latino24.6% · 73
- Two or more races18.5% · 55
- White15.8% · 47
- Asian and Pacific Islander0.7% · 2
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.7% · 2
Gender
Gender distribution for Alyjah
Alyjah leans heavily male at 86.9% of total registrations, but 50 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Alyjah as a male name
- Ranked #6,832 in 2024
- 12 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2010 (21 births)
Alyjah as a female name
- Ranked #16,580 in 2015
- 5 female births in 2015
- Peak: 2014 (8 births)
2020 Census snapshot
The 2020 Census sex table shows Alyjah on both sides of the split. Of the 299 people counted with this name, 234 were male (78.3%) and 65 were female (21.7%).
Popularity
Alyjah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Alyjah from the 1990s through to the 2020s, spanning 4 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2000s, with 160 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2000s peak, Alyjah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Alyjah 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 Alyjah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Alyjahs live
Origin
Meaning and history of Alyjah
The name Alyjah has its roots in ancient Mesopotamia, where it was derived from the Akkadian language spoken in the region around the third millennium BCE. The name is believed to have originated from the Akkadian words "alu" meaning "city" and "jah" meaning "divine protector" or "god." This suggests that the name Alyjah may have initially referred to a person who was considered a protector or guardian of a city or settlement.
While the exact origins of the name are shrouded in the mists of antiquity, it is known that variants of the name were used in various ancient cultures and civilizations across the Middle East and Mediterranean regions. In ancient Phoenician texts, for example, the name appears as "Alyah," which was likely a variant spelling or adaptation of the original Akkadian form.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Alyjah can be found in the Babylonian cuneiform inscriptions from the reign of King Hammurabi, who ruled the city-state of Babylon in the 18th century BCE. These inscriptions mention an individual named "Alyja," who is believed to have been a high-ranking official or nobleman in Hammurabi's court.
Throughout history, the name Alyjah has been borne by several notable individuals, including Alyjas of Tyre, a Phoenician explorer and navigator who is credited with establishing the colony of Carthage in modern-day Tunisia around 814 BCE. Another famous bearer of the name was Alyja ibn Malik, a renowned Arab mathematician and astronomer who lived in the 9th century CE and made significant contributions to the fields of algebra and trigonometry.
In ancient Greece, the name took the form "Alyjas," and was carried by a prominent Athenian statesman and orator who lived in the 5th century BCE. He was known for his eloquence and played a crucial role in the Peloponnesian War against Sparta.
Another notable figure in history who bore the name Alyjah was the 12th-century Persian poet and mystic, Alyja al-Din Rumi. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest spiritual masters and influential poets in the Sufi tradition, and his poetic masterpiece, the Masnavi, is considered one of the greatest works of Persian literature.
While the name Alyjah has its origins in ancient times, it has endured and evolved over the centuries, taking on various forms and spellings across different cultures and languages. Despite its diverse interpretations and adaptations, the name continues to carry a sense of strength, protection, and divine guardianship, reflecting its rich historical roots and enduring cultural significance.
People
Alyjah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Alyjah as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with A
Other first names starting with A with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Alyjah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Alyjah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 379 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Alyjah 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 904,365 US residents.
Is Alyjah a common name?
We classify Alyjah as "Very Rare". It ranks above 81.8% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 383 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Alyjah most popular?
The single biggest year for Alyjah was 2008, when 25 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Alyjah is about 16 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Alyjah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 297 people with the name Alyjah, or 0.10 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #29,680 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 Alyjah 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 Alyjah?
The 2020 Census sex table shows Alyjah on both sides of the split. Of the 299 people counted with this name, 234 were male (78.3%) and 65 were female (21.7%). 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 Alyjah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Alyjah is Black at 39.7%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (24.6%) and Two or More Races (18.5%). 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 Alyjah most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Alyjah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 39.7% (118 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 Alyjah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Alyjah a male name?
Yes, 86.9% of people registered as Alyjah in the SSA data are male. 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 Alyjah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Alyjah 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 Alyjah 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 the name Alyjah?
For a quick modern take, check how many Americans are named Alyjah on our sister site HowManyOfMe.org.