Kesia
Feminine · “cassia”
Job has three daughters at the end of his book, and the text does something unusual: it names them, and says they were the most beautiful women in the land, and that their father gave them an inheritance alongside their brothers. The second is Keziah, and her name is a spice — cassia, the bark that is sold as cinnamon and is not quite cinnamon.
How old is the name Kesia?
Kesia first appears in US birth records in 1964 — 61 years ago. The typical Kesia alive today was born around 1984, making them about 41 years old. About 700 people named Kesia are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Kesia most popular?
Kesia peaked in 1965, reaching #2204 nationally. Today it ranks #13208, 11,004 places below that high. See the whole 1965 chart.
Where it comes from
From qetsi'ah to Kesia
The story of Kesia
The book of Job ends by restoring everything its hero lost and then, almost as an afterthought, names his daughters and no one else. English Protestants noticed, and Keziah entered use in the seventeenth century, staying steadily in circulation in Nonconformist families for two hundred years. It crossed to America with them. Kesia is the simplified spelling — no z, no h — and it appears in American records from the 1960s, which is late enough to suggest that some of it arrived by sound rather than through the Bible.
Meaning
cassia, the spice bark
From the Hebrew qetsi'ah, the name of the cassia tree and its aromatic bark. Cassia was one of the ingredients of the holy anointing oil in Exodus and a serious article of trade; it is closely related to cinnamon and often sold as it. Job's three daughters are all named for beautiful things — a dove, a spice and a cosmetic horn.
How the name formed
- qetsi'ah
- Keziah
- Kesia
Related forms: Ketzia · Keziah
Pronouncing Kesia
kuh-ZEE-uh
Three syllables, stress in the middle. The s in this spelling is said as a z, following the Hebrew; some American families say kuh-SEE-uh instead, which the spelling permits.
Nicknames for Kesia
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
- 1964
- Most girls named
- 197730 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2204reached in 1965
- Change vs 2021
- 0.0%6 in 2025, from 6
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.
Kesia in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Ketzia in Hebrew — transliteration
- Keziah in English — spelling variant
Kesias among us
people named Kesia are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 267,878 born in 2025 was named Kesia
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Kesia
- #13208
- Kesia on the 2025 chart
- #564
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Kesia went to 6 girls in 2025, but Keziah, Kezia and Keziyah and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 5 spellings went to 433, which makes it the 564th most-given girls’ name of the year — 12,644 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 3,712 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 267,878 for Kesia 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 Rosielee test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Kesia's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Rosielee climbed just as high around 1917, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Rosielee's path sketches the road Kesia is walking now.
Kesia 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
Kesia beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Kesia in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It has a documented biblical figure behind her, and the passage she appears in is a striking one.
- The meaning is a real spice with a real history of trade.
- Three open syllables that sit well after almost any surname.
- It is genuinely uncommon while being easy to say.
- Keziah is the traditional spelling and will be written instead by anyone who knows the name.
- The middle consonant is said two ways in American use, so the name arrives differently.
- It sits close to Keisha and Kezia in sound, and will be misheard as both.
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What they receive
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Kesia
Feminine · #13208 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Kesias are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 700 people named Kesia are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Kesia?
- Kesia is one of 5 recorded spellings. Keziah is the more common one — 354 births in 2025 against 6 for Kesia.
- How popular is the name Kesia in 2025?
- Kesia ranks #13208 among US girl names in 2025, with 6 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Kesia?
- About 1 in every 267,878 US girls born in 2025 was named Kesia — 6 in all.
- Will my child share the name Kesia with classmates?
- Kesia will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Kesia
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
John#13208 · Vinnie#13208 · Margery#13208 · Jossie#13208 · Tressa#13208 · Erie#13208 · Bernadine#13208 · Euna#13208
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Kesia? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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