Samirah
A feminine name of Arabic origin meaning "companion" or "one who entertains conversations".
Name Census estimates that about 1,859 living Americans carry the first name Samirah. The name is used almost exclusively for girls. The average person named Samirah today is around 17 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Samirah births was 2013 (84 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Samirah. 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 Samirah with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Samirah is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 17 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
1.9K
~ 1 in 184,376 Americans
Peak year
2013
84 babies that year
Average age
17
years old
2024 SSA rank
#2,955
Tracked since 1977
Census
Samirah in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 1,366 people with the first name Samirah, which placed it at #9,941 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
#9,941
National first-name rank
People counted
1.4K
1,366 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
0.5
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
Black or African American
54.5% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Samirah
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Samirah is Black at 54.5%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (18.5%) and White (13.1%). 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 Samirah 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 Samirah at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- Black or African American54.5% · 745
- Hispanic or Latino18.5% · 253
- White13.1% · 179
- Asian and Pacific Islander6.7% · 91
- Two or more races6.4% · 87
- American Indian and Alaska Native0.8% · 11
Popularity
Samirah: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Samirah from the 1970s through to the 2020s, spanning 6 decades of birth certificate data. The biggest single decade for the name was the 2010s, with 662 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Samirah remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Samirah 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 Samirah during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Samirahs live
The SSA's state-level files cover 13 states and territories. New York, Pennsylvania, California recorded the most babies named Samirah, while Michigan, Maryland, Virginia recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 65 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Samirah
The name Samirah is of Arabic origin and is derived from the Arabic word "samra," meaning "brown" or "dark-skinned." It is believed to have originated in the Middle East during the medieval period, around the 7th to 13th centuries.
The name Samirah is closely associated with Islamic culture and has been found in various historical records and texts. In the Quran, the word "samra" appears in reference to the complexion of certain individuals. However, there is no direct mention of the name Samirah itself in the holy scriptures.
One of the earliest recorded examples of the name Samirah can be traced back to the 10th century, when a woman named Samirah bint Ahmad al-Qayrawan was a renowned scholar and author from the city of Kairouan, Tunisia. She wrote several books on Islamic jurisprudence and was highly respected in her time.
Another notable figure with the name Samirah was Samirah al-Maqdisiyyah, a 12th-century female poet and scholar from Jerusalem. Her poetry collection, "Diwan Samirah al-Maqdisiyyah," is still widely studied and celebrated in the Arabic literary tradition.
In the 13th century, Samirah al-Quds was a prominent Sufi mystic and spiritual teacher from Jerusalem. She was known for her wisdom and teachings on the mystical path of Islam, and her writings have influenced many generations of Sufis.
In the Ottoman Empire, Samirah Khanum was a 16th-century princess and the daughter of Sultan Selim II. She was known for her patronage of the arts and her contribution to the cultural landscape of the Ottoman court.
Samirah Ramadhan, born in 1951, is a contemporary Sudanese author and activist. She has written several novels and short stories that explore themes of gender, identity, and social issues in Sudan. Her works have been widely acclaimed and translated into multiple languages.
These are just a few examples of notable individuals throughout history who bore the name Samirah, reflecting its rich cultural heritage and significance within the Arabic and Islamic traditions.
People
Samirah + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Samirah 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
Samirah: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Samirah?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 1,859 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Samirah 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 184,376 US residents.
Is Samirah a common name?
We classify Samirah as "Rare". It ranks above 93.4% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 1,888 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Samirah most popular?
The single biggest year for Samirah was 2013, when 84 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Samirah is about 17 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Samirah in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 1,366 people with the name Samirah, or 0.45 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #9,941 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 Samirah 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 Samirah?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Samirah appears almost entirely female. Of the 1,369 people counted with this name, 99.5% 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 Samirah?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Samirah is Black at 54.5%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (18.5%) and White (13.1%). 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 Samirah most often in the Census?
Black is the largest reported group for people named Samirah in the 2020 Census, accounting for 54.5% (745 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 Samirah in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Samirah a female name?
Yes, 100.0% of people registered as Samirah 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 Samirah still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Samirah 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 Samirah 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 Samirah?
See how many people share the name Samirah on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.