Hadi
A masculine Arabic name meaning "guide" or "leader".
Name Census estimates that about 2,373 living Americans carry the first name Hadi. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Hadi today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Hadi births was 2018 (112 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Hadi. 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 Hadi with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Hadi is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 15 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
2.4K
~ 1 in 144,439 Americans
Peak year
2018
112 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,609
Tracked since 1980
Census
Hadi in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 3,216 people with the first name Hadi, which placed it at #5,364 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
#5,364
National first-name rank
People counted
3.2K
3,216 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
1.1
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
65.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Hadi
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Hadi is White at 65.9%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (21.9%) and Two or More Races (6.3%). 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 Hadi 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 Hadi at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White65.9% · 2,120
- Asian and Pacific Islander21.9% · 704
- Two or more races6.3% · 202
- Black or African American3.0% · 95
- Hispanic or Latino2.9% · 94
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.0% · 1
Gender
Gender distribution for Hadi
Out of the 2,399 babies given the name Hadi since 1880, 99.7% were registered as male. The name sits firmly on the male side of the spectrum, with only a handful of female registrations across the entire dataset.
Hadi as a male name
- Ranked #1,609 in 2024
- 106 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2018 (112 births)
Hadi as a female name
- Ranked #14,030 in 2024
- 6 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2024 (6 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Hadi leans strongly male. 3,112 people counted with this name were male (96.6%), compared with 110 female bearers (3.4%).
Popularity
Hadi: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Hadi from the 1980s through to the 2020s, spanning 5 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 898 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Hadi remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Hadi 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 Hadi during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Hadis live
The SSA's state-level files cover 11 states and territories. Michigan, California, Texas recorded the most babies named Hadi, while Pennsylvania, Maryland, Ohio recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 130 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Hadi
The given name Hadi has its origins in the Arabic language and culture, with its earliest use dating back to the 7th century CE. The name is derived from the Arabic word "hadi," which means "guide" or "one who leads to the right path."
In Islamic tradition, Hadi is considered one of the names of Allah, referring to His attribute as the guide and leader of humanity towards the straight path. The name holds significant religious and spiritual significance in the Islamic faith.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Hadi can be found in the Quran, the holy book of Islam. In Surah Al-Furqan (Chapter 25, Verse 31), the word "Hadi" is mentioned, referring to Allah as the guide and leader.
Throughout history, several notable figures have borne the name Hadi. One of the earliest was Hadi ibn Yahya al-Bukhari (779-868 CE), a prominent Islamic scholar and hadith collector from Bukhara, present-day Uzbekistan.
Another famous bearer of the name was Hadi ibn Mansur al-Hallaj (858-922 CE), a Persian mystic, philosopher, and poet known for his controversial teachings on divine union with God. He was executed for alleged heresy and became a prominent figure in Sufism.
In the 10th century, Hadi ibn Ibrahim al-Muqtadir (915-932 CE) was the Abbasid caliph who ruled from Baghdad, present-day Iraq, for a brief period.
During the 13th century, Hadi ibn Ahmad al-Saqqaf (1212-1292 CE) was a renowned Shafi'i scholar and jurist from Yemen, known for his extensive works on Islamic jurisprudence.
More recently, Hadi Seyed Soltan (1905-1984) was an Iranian military officer and politician who served as the Prime Minister of Iran from 1961 to 1962.
These are just a few examples of notable figures throughout history who have borne the name Hadi, reflecting its deep-rooted cultural and religious significance in the Arabic and Islamic traditions.
People
Hadi + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Hadi as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with H
Other first names starting with H with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Hadi: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Hadi?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 2,373 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Hadi 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 144,439 US residents.
Is Hadi a common name?
We classify Hadi as "Rare". It ranks above 94.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 2,399 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Hadi most popular?
The single biggest year for Hadi was 2018, when 112 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Hadi is about 15 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Hadi in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 3,216 people with the name Hadi, or 1.06 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #5,364 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 Hadi 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 Hadi?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Hadi leans strongly male. 3,112 people counted with this name were male (96.6%), compared with 110 female bearers (3.4%). 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 Hadi?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Hadi is White at 65.9%. The next largest groups are Asian/Pacific Islander (21.9%) and Two or More Races (6.3%). 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 Hadi most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Hadi in the 2020 Census, accounting for 65.9% (2,120 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 Hadi in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Hadi a male name?
Yes, 99.7% of people registered as Hadi 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 Hadi still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Hadi 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 Hadi 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 are called Hadi?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.