Kandace
Feminine · “queen mother”
Candace was not a name. It was the title of the queen mother of Kush, the Nubian kingdom south of Egypt, and Acts refers to a court official of the Candace, queen of the Ethiopians. Greek readers took the title for a personal name and it has been one ever since.
How old is the name Kandace?
Kandace first appears in US birth records in 1945 — 80 years ago. The typical Kandace alive today was born around 1987, making them about 38 years old. About 6,000 people named Kandace are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Kandace most popular?
Kandace peaked in 1988, reaching #691 nationally. Today it ranks #11932, 11,241 places below that high. See the whole 1988 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Kandake to Kandace
The story of Kandace
The kandakes were real and formidable. Kush, in what is now Sudan, was ruled from Meroe, and its queen mothers held genuine power — several ruled outright. One of them fought a war against Rome under Augustus in the twenties BC, sacked Roman garrisons in Egypt, and negotiated terms that a Roman historian records without much enthusiasm. Greek writers picked up the title, Acts used it, and by the time the Bible was being read in English it had become a woman's name with no memory of the office behind it. Candace and Kandace are the same word; the K is closer to what Meroitic actually had.
Meaning
queen mother, in Meroitic
From Kandake, the Meroitic title of the queen mother or ruling queen of Kush. It was an office rather than a name, held by a succession of women, and the biblical reference treats it as a name because Greek had no reason to know otherwise. The K spelling restores the original consonant.
How the name formed
- Kandake
- Candace
- Kandace
Pronouncing Kandace
KAN-dis
Two syllables, stress on the first, with the ending reduced. kan-DAY-see, with three, follows the Greek and was the older English saying; both are in use.
Nicknames for Kandace
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
- 1945
- Most girls named
- 1989257 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #691reached in 1988
- Change vs 2023
- −61.1%7 in 2025, from 18
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.
Kandace in other languages
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas.
Kandaces among us
people named Kandace are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 229,610 born in 2025 was named Kandace
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Kandace
- #11932
- Kandace on the 2025 chart
- #903
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Kandace went to 7 girls in 2025, but Candace is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 57, which makes it the 903rd most-given girls’ name of the year — 11,029 places above the chart.
- Candace50
- Kandace7
About 1 girl in 28,198 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 229,610 for Kandace 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 Susann test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Kandace's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Susann climbed just as high around 1943, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Susann's path sketches the road Kandace is walking now.
Kandace 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
Kandace beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Kandace in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A documented origin in a real kingdom with real rulers, which can be looked up.
- Three short forms, two of which are full names elsewhere.
- Two syllables and nothing genuinely ambiguous in the spelling.
- Candace is the standard spelling and this one will be corrected toward it.
- The syllable count is unsettled between two and three, and both sayings are old.
- The obvious short form is one letter from an ordinary English word.
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Kandace
Feminine · #11932 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Kandaces are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 6,000 people named Kandace are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Kandace?
- Kandace is one of 2 recorded spellings. Candace is the more common one — 50 births in 2025 against 7 for Kandace.
- How popular is the name Kandace in 2025?
- Kandace ranks #11932 among US girl names in 2025, with 7 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Kandace?
- About 1 in every 229,610 US girls born in 2025 was named Kandace — 7 in all.
- Will my child share the name Kandace with classmates?
- Kandace will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Kandace
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Vina#11932 · Retta#11932 · Missouri#11932 · Iola#11932 · Eddie#11932 · Thomas#11932 · Louetta#11932 · Elvina#11932
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Kandace? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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