Kishan
Masculine · “Sanskrit "dark”
Krishna means black. The god's name is the ordinary Sanskrit word for dark or black, and the conventional blue skin of the paintings is a much later artistic solution to depicting a dark-skinned deity — the name says one thing and the pictures say another.
How old is the name Kishan?
Kishan first appears in US birth records in 1973 — 52 years ago. The typical Kishan alive today was born around 1999, making them about 26 years old. About 1,000 people named Kishan are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Kishan most popular?
Kishan peaked in 1997, reaching #1519 nationally. Today it ranks #7679, 6,160 places below that high. See the whole 1997 chart.
Where it comes from
From krishna to Kishan
The story of Kishan
Sanskrit texts describe Krishna as dark, and the epithets used for him — Shyam, dark; Ghanashyam, dark as a raincloud — say the same. The blue of devotional painting appears comparatively late and is generally explained as a convention for representing the divine dark, blue being the color of the sky and the deep water and available as a pigment. Vishnu and Rama are shown the same way. The distinction matters because the name itself is not metaphorical: it is a color word, applied directly. Kishan is a standard north Indian form; the American figures peak in 1997, with South Asian immigration.
Meaning
Sanskrit "dark, black"
From krishna, black or dark blue, an ordinary Sanskrit adjective — the same word behind the name of the Krishna river and of the dark fortnight of the lunar month, krishna paksha. Kishan and Kishen are Hindi forms of the god's name. Separately, Hindi kisan means a farmer, from Sanskrit krishaka, a ploughman, and is a different word.
How the name formed
- krishna
- Kishan
Related forms: किशन · Krishna · Kishen
Pronouncing Kishan
KEE-shun
Two syllables, stress on the first, with the final vowel barely sounded. The sh is retroflex in Indian pronunciation, made further back than the English sh.
Nicknames for Kishan
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
- 1973
- Most boys named
- 199768 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1519reached in 1997
- Change vs 2024
- +11.1%10 in 2025, from 9
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.
Kishan in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- किशन in Hindi — transliteration
- Krishna in Sanskrit — related form
- Kishen in English — spelling variant
Kishans among us
people named Kishan are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 170,808 born in 2025 was named Kishan
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 Baltazar test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Kishan's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Baltazar climbed just as high around 1948, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Baltazar's path sketches the road Kishan is walking now.
Kishan 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
Kishan beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Kishan in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The meaning is settled and the divine association is major.
- Kish is an easy English short form.
- It is short, two syllables and read correctly by English speakers.
- Kishen and Krishan are competing forms of the same name.
- It is easily confused with kisan, the Hindi word for a farmer.
- The religious association is explicit and specific.
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What they receive
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Kishan
Masculine · #7679 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Kishans are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Kishan are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Kishan in 2025?
- Kishan ranks #7679 among US boy names in 2025, with 10 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Kishan?
- About 1 in every 170,808 US boys born in 2025 was named Kishan — 10 in all.
- Will my child share the name Kishan with classmates?
- Kishan will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Kishan
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Early#7679 · Obie#7679 · Huston#7679 · Knute#7679 · Rance#7679 · Blain#7679 · Doyle#7679 · Millard#7679
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Kishan? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Kishan and another name?
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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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