Maleah
Of Arabic origin meaning "princess", "queen", or "sovereign".
Name Census estimates that about 9,111 living Americans carry the first name Maleah. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Maleah today is around 16 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Maleah births was 2009 (508 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Maleah. 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 Maleah with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Maleah is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 16 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
9.1K
~ 1 in 37,620 Americans
Peak year
2009
508 babies that year
Average age
16
years old
2024 SSA rank
#1,210
Tracked since 1956
Census
Maleah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 6,712 people with the first name Maleah, which placed it at #3,206 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
#3,206
National first-name rank
People counted
6.7K
6,712 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
2.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
35.9% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Maleah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Maleah is White at 35.9%. The next largest groups are Black (31.4%) and Two or More Races (15.1%). 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 Maleah 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 Maleah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White35.9% · 2,409
- Black or African American31.4% · 2,106
- Two or more races15.1% · 1,011
- Hispanic or Latino13.3% · 890
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.0% · 200
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.4% · 96
Popularity
Maleah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Maleah from the 1950s through to the 2020s, spanning 8 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 4,114 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Maleah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Maleah 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 Maleah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Maleahs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 38 states and territories. California, Texas, Florida recorded the most babies named Maleah, while North Dakota, Massachusetts, Nebraska recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 194 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Maleah
The given name Maleah is a relatively modern invention, with its precise origins somewhat unclear. It is believed to have emerged in the late 20th century, potentially as a combination of the names Malia and Leah. The name Malia has Hawaiian roots, derived from the Hawaiian word for "Mary." Meanwhile, Leah is a Hebrew name with biblical origins, meaning "weary" or "tired."
While the name Maleah itself does not appear to have any direct historical references or appearances in ancient texts or religious scriptures, its potential constituent parts do have rich histories. The name Malia, for instance, is derived from the Hawaiian version of the name Mary, which has its roots in the Hebrew name Miryam, meaning "bitter" or "beloved."
One of the earliest recorded individuals with the name Maleah was Maleah Brown, an American actress born in 1996. She is known for her roles in television shows such as "The Game" and "Raising Hope." Another notable figure is Maleah Davis, an American basketball player who played for the University of Southern California in the early 2000s.
In the realm of music, Maleah Jacobs is an American singer and songwriter who gained recognition in the early 2010s for her collaborations with artists like Cee Lo Green and Diplo. She has also released her own music and has performed at various festivals and events.
Maleah Grover-Kilshaw, born in 1998, is a Canadian actress who has appeared in television shows like "The Killing" and "The Bletchley Circle." She has also had roles in several films, including "The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part 2."
Lastly, Maleah Loyd was an American child who gained national attention in 2019 when she went missing in Houston, Texas, at the age of 4. Her disappearance sparked a widespread search, and her case brought attention to issues of child safety and the challenges faced by law enforcement in missing persons cases.
People
Maleah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Maleah as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with M
Other first names starting with M with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Maleah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Maleah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 9,111 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Maleah 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 37,620 US residents.
Is Maleah a common name?
We classify Maleah as "Rare". It ranks above 97.6% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 9,237 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Maleah most popular?
The single biggest year for Maleah was 2009, when 508 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Maleah 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 Maleah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 6,712 people with the name Maleah, or 2.22 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #3,206 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 Maleah 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 Maleah?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Maleah appears almost entirely female. Of the 6,718 people counted with this name, 99.8% were female and only a very small share were male. 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 Maleah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Maleah is White at 35.9%. The next largest groups are Black (31.4%) and Two or More Races (15.1%). 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 Maleah most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Maleah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 35.9% (2,409 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 Maleah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Maleah a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Maleah in the SSA data are female. 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 Maleah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Maleah 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 Maleah 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 Maleah?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.