Muhammad
An Arabic masculine name meaning "praiseworthy" or "praised one".
Name Census estimates that about 20,201 living Americans carry the first name Muhammad. It sits at #245 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Muhammad today is around 15 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Muhammad births was 2024 (1,441 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Muhammad. 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 Muhammad with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Muhammad 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
20K
~ 1 in 16,967 Americans
Peak year
2024
1,441 babies that year
Average age
15
years old
2024 SSA rank
#245
Tracked since 1929
Census
Muhammad in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 33,692 people with the first name Muhammad, which placed it at #1,172 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
#1,172
National first-name rank
People counted
34K
33,692 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
11.2
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Asian and Pacific Islander
81.0% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Muhammad
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Muhammad is Asian/Pacific Islander at 81.0%. The next largest groups are White (7.7%) and Black (7.6%). 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 Muhammad 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 Muhammad at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Asian and Pacific Islander81.0% · 27,297
- White7.7% · 2,586
- Black or African American7.6% · 2,556
- Two or more races2.7% · 916
- Hispanic or Latino0.9% · 288
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.1% · 49
Popularity
Muhammad: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Muhammad from the 1920s through to the 2020s, spanning 9 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 7,800 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Muhammad remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Muhammad 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 Muhammad during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Muhammads live
The SSA's state-level files cover 38 states and territories. New York, California, Texas recorded the most babies named Muhammad, while Utah, Nebraska, North Dakota recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 483 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Muhammad
The name Muhammad is an Arabic name derived from the root word ḥ-m-d, which means "to praise" or "to glorify". It is a masculine name that has been used in the Arab world for centuries, originating during the time of the Islamic prophet Muhammad, who lived in the 6th and 7th centuries CE.
Muhammad was the name of the founder of Islam, who was born in Mecca in 570 CE. The Quran, the holy book of Islam, mentions his name numerous times, and he is considered the final prophet in the Islamic faith. His life and teachings have had a profound impact on the spread of Islam and the development of Islamic culture and civilization.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Muhammad can be found in the Quranic verses and the hadith literature, which are the records of the Prophet's sayings and actions. The name also appears in various historical accounts and biographies of the Prophet Muhammad, written by early Islamic scholars and historians.
Throughout history, many notable figures have borne the name Muhammad. Here are five examples:
1. Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi (c. 780 - c. 850 CE), a Persian mathematician, astronomer, and geographer who is considered the father of algebra and the algorithm.
2. Muhammad al-Idrisi (1099 - 1166 CE), an Arab geographer, cartographer, and Egyptologist who created one of the most detailed maps of the world in the 12th century.
3. Muhammad ibn Battuta (1304 - 1369 CE), a Moroccan explorer and scholar who traveled extensively across Africa, Asia, and Europe, documenting his journey in a famous travel narrative.
4. Muhammad Iqbal (1877 - 1938 CE), a philosopher, poet, and politician from British India, who is widely regarded as the spiritual father of the Pakistani nation.
5. Muhammad Ali (1942 - 2016 CE), an American professional boxer, activist, and philanthropist, widely regarded as one of the most significant and celebrated figures of the 20th century.
The name Muhammad has been widely popular among Muslims throughout history, and it continues to be one of the most commonly used names in Muslim communities around the world today.
Notable bearers
Famous people named Muhammad
People
Muhammad + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Muhammad 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
Muhammad: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Muhammad?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 20,201 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Muhammad 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 16,967 US residents.
Is Muhammad a common name?
We classify Muhammad as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98.5% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 20,478 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Muhammad most popular?
The single biggest year for Muhammad was 2024, when 1,441 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Muhammad 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 Muhammad in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 33,692 people with the name Muhammad, or 11.16 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #1,172 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 Muhammad 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 Muhammad?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Muhammad appears almost entirely male. Of the 33,698 people counted with this name, 99.8% were male and only a very small share were female. 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 Muhammad?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Muhammad is Asian/Pacific Islander at 81.0%. The next largest groups are White (7.7%) and Black (7.6%). 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 Muhammad most often in the Census?
Asian/Pacific Islander is the largest reported group for people named Muhammad in the 2020 Census, accounting for 81.0% (27,297 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 Muhammad in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Muhammad a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Muhammad 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 Muhammad still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Muhammad 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 Muhammad 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 Americans are named Muhammad?
For a quick modern estimate, our sister site HowManyOfMe.org answers that in one glance, with the living-bearer count front and centre.