Sakariya
An Arabic name meaning "sober" or "righteous, pious".
Name Census estimates that about 6 living Americans carry the first name Sakariya. The name is used almost exclusively for boys. The average person named Sakariya today is around 18 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Sakariya births was 2008 (6 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Sakariya. 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 Sakariya with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Fewer than 100 living Americans are believed to carry the name Sakariya. It is among the rarest names in the SSA records.
People living today
6
~ 1 in 57,125,723 Americans
Peak year
2008
6 babies that year
Average age
18
years old
2008 SSA rank
#12,287
Tracked since 2008
Popularity
Sakariya: popularity over time
Babies born per year
Decades
Sakariya 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 Sakariya during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
| Decade | Male | Female | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2000s | 6 | 0 | 6 |
Origin
Meaning and history of Sakariya
The name Sakariya has its origins in the ancient Semitic languages, specifically Hebrew and Arabic. It is derived from the Biblical name "Zechariah," which means "God remembers" or "God has remembered." The name can be traced back to the 6th century BCE, when it was borne by the prophet Zechariah, one of the twelve minor prophets in the Hebrew Bible.
In the Hebrew Bible, the Book of Zechariah is attributed to the prophet Zechariah, who lived during the period of the rebuilding of the Second Temple in Jerusalem after the Babylonian exile. The name Zechariah appears multiple times in the Old Testament, including as the name of a priest who was the father of John the Baptist in the New Testament.
The Arabic variation of the name, Sakariya, is also found in the Quran, where it refers to the same biblical prophet. In Islamic tradition, Zechariah (Sakariya) is revered as one of the prophets of God and is mentioned in various verses of the Quran.
One of the earliest recorded individuals with the name Sakariya was Sakariya al-Razi, a renowned Persian polymath who lived from 854 to 925 CE. He was a renowned physician, philosopher, and alchemist, and his contributions to various fields of knowledge were significant during the Islamic Golden Age.
Another notable figure in history with the name Sakariya was Sakariya ibn Mahmud al-Razi, a Persian physician and philosopher who lived in the 10th century CE. He was known for his works on medicine and philosophy, and his writings influenced many scholars of his time.
In the 12th century, there was Sakariya al-Qazwini, an Arab writer and geographer who authored the famous work "Aja'ib al-Makhluqat wa Ghara'ib al-Mawjudat" (The Wonders of Creation and the Oddities of Existence), which was a comprehensive encyclopedia on geography, cosmography, and natural history.
In the 16th century, Sakariya al-Nawawi was an Ottoman scholar and Sufi mystic who wrote extensively on Islamic law and spirituality. He was a prominent figure in the Naqshbandi Sufi order and is revered for his contributions to Islamic literature.
Sakariya ibn Muhammad al-Qurashi was a 17th-century Arab scholar and historian from Mecca. He is known for his historical work "Al-Jawahir al-Munaddadah fi Tabaqat al-Hanafiyyah" (The Scattered Pearls in the Generations of the Hanafis), which chronicled the lives of prominent Hanafi scholars.
People
Sakariya + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Sakariya as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with S
Other first names starting with S with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Sakariya: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Sakariya?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 6 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Sakariya 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 57,125,723 US residents.
Is Sakariya a common name?
We classify Sakariya as "Very Rare". It ranks above 22.3% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 6 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Sakariya most popular?
The single biggest year for Sakariya was 2008, when 6 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Sakariya is about 18 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
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 Sakariya in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Sakariya a male name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Sakariya 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 Sakariya still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Sakariya 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 Sakariya 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.
Does every first name have Census demographic data?
No. The public Census first-name release only covers names that met the Bureau's publication rules, so many rarer names in the SSA files do not have a published Census demographic snapshot. In those cases, the page still shows the SSA trend, gender history, and state data.
How many people are called Sakariya?
Want to know how many people have the name Sakariya? HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site, puts the living-bearer count front and centre.