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Maddax

Masculine · “son of Madog”

Maddax is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 569 boys against 13 girls since 1880.

2003high 2020
#5861 in the U.S.given to only a few children a year
rare15 boys in 2025

Maddax is a Welsh patronymic with an American letter. Madog was a Welsh personal name, ap Madog meant the son of Madog, and English clerks compressed the phrase into the surname Maddox. Replace the ox with ax and you have this spelling, which peaked in 2020 — the newest name in this part of the list.

How old is the name Maddax?

Maddax first appears in US birth records in 2003 — 22 years ago. The typical Maddax is a kid of about 11 — this name's wave is very recent. About 600 people named Maddax are estimated to be alive in the US today.

When was the name Maddax most popular?

Maddax peaked in 2020, reaching #3074 nationally. Today it ranks #5861, 2,787 places below that high. See the whole 2020 chart.

Compare this nameMore “M” names

Lists built from the same records:

I

Where it comes from

The story of Maddax

Madog ap Owain Gwynedd is the subject of one of the more persistent legends in Welsh tradition: a twelfth-century prince said to have sailed to America three hundred years before Columbus, a story that was taken seriously enough in the eighteenth century to send expeditions looking for Welsh-speaking Native Americans. The name itself was ordinary in medieval Wales and produced the surnames Maddox, Maddocks and Madoc. American use as a given name is recent and rose sharply after 2002, when the name was widely reported in connection with a celebrity adoption; the respellings, Maddax and Maddex among them, followed the way respellings always follow a fast rise.

Meaningscholars disagree

son of Madog — 'fortunate, beneficent'

Welsh Madog is generally derived from mad, 'fortunate, good, beneficent', with a common Welsh diminutive ending. The surname Maddox comes from ap Madog, 'son of Madog', with the p of ap absorbed into the following consonant — the same process that turns ap Hywel into Powell and ap Rhys into Price. The compression is settled; the meaning of the root mad is the less certain part, though 'fortunate' is the standard reading.

How the name formed

  1. mad
  2. Madog
  3. ap Madog
  4. Maddox
  5. Maddax

Related forms: Madog · Maddox · Maddocks

Pronouncing Maddax

MAD-ax

Two syllables, stress on the first, with the short a of mad in both. The a in the second syllable is the only difference from Maddox, and in fast American speech the two are nearly indistinguishable.

Nicknames for Maddax

High

MaxTakes the back of the name, and is a complete name in its own right
MadThe front clip, though it collides with the ordinary word
MaddyA softer pet form, though it is more usually attached to girls' names
DaxBuilt from the middle and end
II

What the data says

The long climb, and where it stands now

BOYS NAMED · 2003–202537190371520032025

US babies named Maddax per year from 2003 to 2025
AVERAGE RANK BY DECADE#1#10#100#1000#30742000s2020s

The same years in position rather than babies

First recorded
2003
Most boys named
202037 — the highest on record
Peak rank
#3074reached in 2020
Change vs 2024
+87.5%15 in 2025, from 8
Maddax sits in the rare tail. Its best year on record was 2020, with 37 boys. Today it is given to few enough children that it does not enter the ranked charts at all.

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.

Maddax in other languages

The same name elsewhere

  • Madog in Welsh — related form
  • Maddox in English — spelling variant
  • Maddocks in Welsh — related form

Strongest US states over the last decade: Iowa, Texas.

Maddaxs among us

600

people named Maddax are estimated to be alive in the US today

About 1 boy in 113,872 born in 2025 was named Maddax

Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method

III

Is it right for you

The Hazael test

Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Maddax's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Hazael climbed just as high around 2004, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Hazael's path sketches the road Maddax is walking now.

40%chance Maddax will feel “very 2010s” by 2040
Maddax, aligned on its peakHazael· peak 2004not yet written
#1#10#100#1000peak-20 yrs+20 yrsHazael · #4364Maddax today
Maddax today is about where Hazael stood in 2009 — 5 years past a #3074-sized peak. By 2024, Hazael had settled around #4364.
Ages quietlysteadyDates fast

Maddax 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

Maddax beside its neighbors

The names ranked closest to Maddax in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.

Maddaxthis name15#5861Eber15#5861Wilton15#5861Ruby15#5861Stacy15#5861

US boys given each name in 2025.

The trade-off

Practical strengths
  • Max and Dax are both current short forms available inside it.
  • The Welsh surname behind it is genuinely medieval and easy to explain.
  • The pronunciation is obvious from the spelling.
What to consider
  • Maddox is far the more common spelling and hers will be written that way.
  • The first syllable is the ordinary word mad, which children notice.
  • The x spelling dates the name closely to the 2005-2025 window.

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Maddax

Masculine · #5861 in the U.S.

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Frequently asked

How many Maddaxs 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 Maddax are estimated to be alive in the US today.
How popular is the name Maddax in 2025?
Maddax ranks #5861 among US boy names in 2025, with 15 babies given the name.
How rare is the name Maddax?
About 1 in every 113,872 US boys born in 2025 was named Maddax — 15 in all.
Will my child share the name Maddax with classmates?
Maddax will almost certainly be the only one in school.

Ranked beside Maddax

Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.

Eber#5861 · Wilton#5861 · Ruby#5861 · Stacy#5861 · Garner#5861 · Caldwell#5861 · Severin#5861 · Newton#5861

Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Maddax? See the current top 100.

Choosing between Maddax and another name?

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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology

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