Boubacar
Masculine · “father of the young camel”
Boubacar is the West African form of Abu Bakr, one of the oldest and most honored names in Islam, spelled the way French colonial clerks heard it in Bamako, Dakar and Conakry. It is a Mande and Fula and Wolof name now, thoroughly at home, and it arrived in the United States with families from those countries.
How old is the name Boubacar?
Boubacar first appears in US birth records in 1994 — 31 years ago. The typical Boubacar is a kid of about 11 — this name's wave is very recent. About 500 people named Boubacar are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Boubacar most popular?
Boubacar peaked in 2004, reaching #3860 nationally. Today it ranks #4707, 847 places below that high. See the whole 2004 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Abu Bakr to Boubacar
The story of Boubacar
Islam reached West Africa across the Sahara by trade rather than conquest, and the names came with it, reshaped by the languages they landed in. Abu Bakr became Boubacar, Bubacarr, Aboubacar and Bakary across Mali, Senegal, Guinea, Gambia and Burkina Faso, the spelling depending on whether French or English clerks were writing it down. In the francophone countries it has been among the most-given names for generations, and it came into American records with West African migration of the last few decades.
Meaning
father of the young camel
Arabic Abu Bakr: abu, father of, and bakr, a young camel. The phrase is a kunya, an Arabic byname of the father-of kind, rather than a description, and it was borne by the first caliph, the closest companion of the Prophet Muhammad.
How the name formed
- Abu Bakr
- Boubacar
Related forms: Abu Bakr · Bubacarr · Aboubacar · Bakary · Ebubekir · Abubakar
Pronouncing Boubacar
boo-bah-KAR
Three syllables, stress at the end, the ou said as in soup. French spelling conventions are doing the work here: ou is oo, and the final r is fully pronounced in West African French.
Nicknames for Boubacar
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1994
- Most boys named
- 201627 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #3860reached in 2004
- Change vs 2024
- −22.2%21 in 2025, from 27
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Boubacar in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Abu Bakr in Arabic — same name
- Bubacarr in Gambian English — spelling variant
- Aboubacar in French — spelling variant
- Bakary in Mandinka — related form
- Ebubekir in Turkish — same name
- Abubakar in Indonesian — spelling variant
Boubacars among us
people named Boubacar are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 81,337 born in 2025 was named Boubacar
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Kemal test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Boubacar's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Kemal climbed just as high around 1981, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Kemal's path sketches the road Boubacar is walking now.
Boubacar sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Boubacar beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Boubacar in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Immediately recognized across West Africa and the wider Muslim world.
- Bouba is a warm, ready short form that needs no explaining at home.
- The name has an unbroken documented history of more than thirteen centuries.
- English speakers read ou as in about rather than as in soup, so the first syllable is regularly mispronounced.
- The spelling competes with Aboubacar, Bubacarr and Abubakar, and forms will not always match across one family.
- It is long for American paperwork and gets shortened without anyone asking.
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What they receive
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Boubacar
Masculine · #4707 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Boubacars are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 500 people named Boubacar are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Boubacar in 2025?
- Boubacar ranks #4707 among US boy names in 2025, with 21 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Boubacar?
- About 1 in every 81,337 US boys born in 2025 was named Boubacar — 21 in all.
- Will my child share the name Boubacar with classmates?
- Boubacar will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Boubacar
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Ole#4707 · Shelton#4707 · Constantino#4707 · Adel#4707 · Cord#4707 · Zalman#4707 · Montez#4707 · Homer#4707
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Boubacar? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Boubacar and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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