Zayne
A masculine name of Arabic origin meaning "beautiful and good".
Name Census estimates that about 12,293 living Americans carry the first name Zayne. It sits at #447 in the overall ranking, outside the top 50 but still well-represented. It is a predominantly male name (98.4% of registrations). The average person named Zayne today is around 11 years old, and the year with the single highest number of Zayne births was 2021 (873 babies).
This page is the full Name Census profile for Zayne. 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 Zayne with official rankings and popularity over time.
Key insights
- • Although Zayne is used almost entirely for boys, the SSA data does show 203 girls registered with the name since 1880.
- • Zayne is a relatively new arrival in the SSA data. The average bearer is just 11 years old, meaning it gained most of its traction in the last two decades.
People living today
12K
~ 1 in 27,882 Americans
Peak year
2021
873 babies that year
Average age
11
years old
2024 SSA rank
#447
Tracked since 1982
Census
Zayne in the 2020 Census
The 2020 Census recorded 7,333 people with the first name Zayne, which placed it at #3,032 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
#3,032
National first-name rank
People counted
7.3K
7,333 in the published race/origin table
Per 100,000
2.4
People with this name in 2020
Largest reported group
White
61.8% of people with this name
Demographics
Ancestry and ethnicity for Zayne
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Zayne is White at 61.8%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (13.6%) and Two or More Races (11.3%). 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 Zayne 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 Zayne at the time of the 2020 Census, not any inherent property of the name itself.
- White61.8% · 4,529
- Hispanic or Latino13.6% · 996
- Two or more races11.3% · 830
- Black or African American8.7% · 637
- Asian and Pacific Islander3.1% · 227
- American Indian and Alaska Native1.6% · 114
Gender
Gender distribution for Zayne
Zayne leans heavily male at 98.4% of total registrations, but 203 girls have also been registered with the name over the years, giving it a small but present crossover presence.
Zayne as a male name
- Ranked #447 in 2024
- 703 male births in 2024
- Peak: 2021 (862 births)
Zayne as a female name
- Ranked #11,057 in 2024
- 9 female births in 2024
- Peak: 2014 (14 births)
2020 Census snapshot
In the 2020 Census sex table, Zayne leans strongly male. 7,146 people counted with this name were male (97.4%), compared with 192 female bearers (2.6%).
Popularity
Zayne: popularity over time
The SSA tracks Zayne 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 6,009 total registrations. Although the numbers have come down from the 2010s peak, Zayne remains solidly in use and shows no sign of disappearing from maternity wards.
Babies born per year
Decades
Zayne 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 Zayne during that decade, along with a combined total. This is useful for spotting eras where the name surged or retreated.
Geography
Where Zaynes live
The SSA's state-level files cover 47 states and territories. Texas, California, Florida recorded the most babies named Zayne, while Wyoming, Montana, New Hampshire recorded the fewest. The average across all reporting states is about 228 registrations each.
Origin
Meaning and history of Zayne
The name Zayne is a modern spelling variation of the Arabic name Zain, which dates back to ancient times. It is derived from the Arabic word "zayn," meaning "beauty" or "grace." The name has been in use for centuries in Arabic-speaking regions, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa.
One of the earliest recorded instances of the name Zain can be found in the Quran, the central religious text of Islam. It is mentioned as the name of a prophet who lived around the 7th century BCE. The Quran refers to him as "Zain al-Abidin," which translates to "the ornament of the worshippers."
In the 12th century, a famous Muslim scholar and mystic from Iran was known as Zain al-Din al-Razi. He was renowned for his works on philosophy, medicine, and astronomy. Another notable figure was Zain al-Abidin, the fourth Imam of the Shia Muslim tradition, who lived in the 7th century CE and is revered for his piety and wisdom.
During the Ottoman Empire, which ruled over large parts of the Middle East and North Africa from the 13th to the early 20th centuries, the name Zain was widely used among the ruling elite and aristocracy. One example is Zain al-Abidin, an Ottoman prince and son of Sultan Ahmed III, who lived in the 18th century.
In more recent history, there have been several notable individuals with the name Zayne or its variations. Zayn Malik, a British singer and former member of the boy band One Direction, was born in 1993 and helped popularize the spelling "Zayn" in the Western world. Another example is Zayn al-Abidin Ben Ali, the former President of Tunisia, who ruled from 1987 to 2011.
While the spelling "Zayne" is relatively modern, it retains the cultural and linguistic roots of the Arabic name Zain, which has been in use for centuries and holds significant historical and religious significance in the Arab world.
People
Zayne + last name combinations
How many people share a full name with Zayne as the first name? Click a combination below to see the estimate, or search any pairing.
Related
Other names starting with Z
Other first names starting with Z with a similar number of bearers.
FAQ
Zayne: questions and answers
How many people in the U.S. are named Zayne?
Name Census puts the figure at roughly 12,293 living Americans. We arrive at this by taking every SSA birth registration for Zayne 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 27,882 US residents.
Is Zayne a common name?
We classify Zayne as "Uncommon". It ranks above 98% of all first names in the SSA dataset by living bearers. Across the full history of the data, 12,400 babies have been registered with this name.
When was Zayne most popular?
The single biggest year for Zayne was 2021, when 873 babies received the name. The fact that the average living Zayne is about 11 years old gives you a rough sense of which era contributed the most bearers who are still alive today.
How common was Zayne in the 2020 Census?
The published 2020 Census first-name tables recorded 7,333 people with the name Zayne, or 2.43 per 100,000 residents. That placed it at #3,032 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 Zayne 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 Zayne?
In the 2020 Census sex table, Zayne leans strongly male. 7,146 people counted with this name were male (97.4%), compared with 192 female bearers (2.6%). 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 Zayne?
In the 2020 Census race and Hispanic-origin table, the largest reported group for people named Zayne is White at 61.8%. The next largest groups are Hispanic (13.6%) and Two or More Races (11.3%). 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 Zayne most often in the Census?
White is the largest reported group for people named Zayne in the 2020 Census, accounting for 61.8% (4,529 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 Zayne in that year. That makes it useful for spotting when the name rose, peaked, or faded.
Is Zayne a male name?
Yes, 98.4% of people registered as Zayne 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 Zayne still being used today?
Yes. The SSA still recorded Zayne 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 Zayne 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 Zayne?
See how many people share the name Zayne on HowManyOfMe.org, our sister site built around that single question.