Kadija
Feminine · “born early”
Khadija was a merchant with her own caravans who employed Muhammad, then proposed to him. She was fifteen years older, she was the first person to believe him, and for as long as she lived he took no other wife. The name has been given ever since, from Morocco to Indonesia.
How old is the name Kadija?
Kadija first appears in US birth records in 1986 — 39 years ago. The typical Kadija alive today was born around 2005, making them about 20 years old. About 600 people named Kadija are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Kadija most popular?
Kadija peaked in 1994, reaching #2209 nationally. Today it ranks #10917, 8,708 places below that high. See the whole 1994 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Khadija to Kadija
The story of Kadija
The h in Khadija is not the English h. Arabic has a sound made at the back of the throat, like the ch in the Scottish loch, and English has no letter for it, so transliterators write kh and hope. French, which also lacks the sound, tends to write k alone, and West African countries administered in French therefore spell the name Kadija or Kadiatou. That is why the k-only spelling reaches American records mostly through Senegal, Mali, Guinea and Sierra Leone rather than through the Middle East. The name is the same; only the missing letter differs, and what it marks is a sound the receiving language could not make.
Meaningscholars disagree
born early
The reading usually given is from an Arabic root meaning to be born prematurely — an odd meaning for so revered a name, which is one reason it is disputed. Alternatives connect it to a word for a trusted friend. Nothing has been settled, and the name's weight comes from its bearer rather than from its etymology.
How the name formed
- Khadija
- Kadija
Related forms: Khadija · Kadiatou · Hatice · Hadija
Pronouncing Kadija
kah-DEE-jah
Three syllables, stress in the middle. In Arabic the first consonant is made at the back of the throat, which English cannot manage; a plain k is the accepted substitute everywhere the sound is missing.
Nicknames for Kadija
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
- 1986
- Most girls named
- 199460 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2209reached in 1994
- Change vs 2024
- +60.0%8 in 2025, from 5
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.
Kadija in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Khadija in Arabic — same name
- Kadiatou in French — related form
- Hatice in Turkish — same name
- Hadija in Swahili — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: New York.
Kadijas among us
people named Kadija are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 200,908 born in 2025 was named Kadija
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Kadija
- #10917
- Kadija on the 2025 chart
- #570
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Kadija went to 8 girls in 2025, but Khadija, Khadijah and Kadijah are the same name said out loud. Together the 4 spellings went to 424, which makes it the 570th most-given girls’ name of the year — 10,347 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 3,791 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 200,908 for Kadija itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Beckey test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Kadija's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Beckey climbed just as high around 1958, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Beckey's path sketches the road Kadija is walking now.
Kadija 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
Kadija beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Kadija in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- One of the most widely given women's names in the world, recognized on four continents.
- Three established short forms, all in real use rather than invented.
- Three open syllables with a clear stress and nothing hard for English speakers.
- Khadija is the standard spelling internationally, so this one will be read as a variant.
- The etymology usually printed for it is disputed, and the name's meaning is not where its weight is.
- It is close enough to Kadisha, Khadijah and Hadija to be misspelled in several directions.
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What they receive
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Kadija
Feminine · #10917 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Kadijas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 600 people named Kadija are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Kadija?
- Kadija is one of 4 recorded spellings. Khadija is the more common one — 258 births in 2025 against 8 for Kadija.
- How popular is the name Kadija in 2025?
- Kadija ranks #10917 among US girl names in 2025, with 8 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Kadija?
- About 1 in every 200,908 US girls born in 2025 was named Kadija — 8 in all.
- Will my child share the name Kadija with classmates?
- Kadija will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Kadija
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Edythe#10917 · Tessie#10917 · Drusilla#10917 · Eugenie#10917 · Ivah#10917 · Karri#10917 · Claribel#10917 · Myrtle#10917
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Kadija? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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