Mckenna
Feminine · “son of Cionaodh”
Mckenna is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 44,308 girls against 183 boys since 1880.
Mckenna began as a Gaelic family name from Ulster — the McKennas long associated with the Truagh district of County Monaghan — and it carries inside it the old Irish name element Aodh, fire. It came to American girls the way Mackenzie and Madison did, by way of the surname, and it keeps that surname's clean two-beat swing: muh-KEN-uh.
How old is the name Mckenna?
Mckenna first appears in US birth records in 1972 — 53 years ago. The typical Mckenna alive today was born around 2007, making them about 18 years old. About 44,000 people named Mckenna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mckenna most popular?
Mckenna peaked in 2002, reaching #177 nationally. Today it ranks #410, 233 places below that high. See the whole 2002 chart.
Mckenna appears on this list:
Where it comes from
From Aodh to Mckenna
The story of Mckenna
The name starts in Irish as Mac Cionaoith, a patronymic surname of medieval Ulster; the McKennas were chiefs in the Truagh country of County Monaghan. Emigration carried it to Britain, North America and Australia, where the Gaelic Mac was flattened into Mc and the spelling settled into McKenna. In the later twentieth century American parents began lifting Irish and Scottish surnames onto the front of the name — Kelly, Casey, Mackenzie — and Mckenna joined that current as a girl's name. The version without the interior capital, Mckenna, is the plainest of several competing spellings.
Meaning
son of Cionaodh — a Gaelic given name built on the fire element Aodh
The surname derivation from Mac Cionaoith (older Mac Cionaodha) is well established. Cionaodh itself is the Irish counterpart of the Scottish Cinaed, the name behind Kenneth, and is usually read as 'born of fire'.
How the name formed
- Aodh
- Cionaodh
- Mac Cionaoith
- McKenna
- Mckenna
Related forms: Mac Cionaoith · McKenna · Makenna · Mackenna · MacCionaodha · Kenna
Pronouncing Mckenna
muh-KEN-uh
Three syllables with the weight on the middle one; the opening Mc is an unstressed 'muh'. Some speakers say mick-KEN-uh, closer to the surname.
Nicknames for Mckenna
High
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
- 1972
- Most girls named
- 20021,795 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #177reached in 2002
- Change vs 2024
- −8.6%758 in 2025, from 829
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.
Mckenna in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Mac Cionaoith in Irish — same name
- McKenna in English — spelling variant
- Makenna in English — spelling variant
- Mackenna in English — spelling variant
- MacCionaodha in Scottish Gaelic — related form
- Kenna in Scots — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, New York, Pennsylvania.
Mckennas among us
people named Mckenna are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 2,120 born in 2025 was named Mckenna
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 Farrah test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Mckenna's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Farrah climbed just as high around 1977, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Farrah's path sketches the road Mckenna is walking now.
Mckenna 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
Where Mckenna is headed
Mckenna should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Mckenna beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Mckenna in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Reads correctly on sight for most English speakers — the Mc- surname pattern is already familiar from names like Mackenzie.
- Comes with a ready-made short form, Kenna, which also works as a full name on paper.
- A documented Gaelic surname with centuries of record behind it, not a recent coinage.
- Common enough to be recognized instantly, uncommon enough that a classroom rarely holds two.
- The spelling will need saying out loud often: Mckenna, McKenna, Mackenna and Makenna all circulate, and many people default to the interior capital K when writing it down.
- It sits close to Mackenzie, Makayla and Mikayla in sound, so mishearings and mix-ups are likely at roll call.
- As a surname-name it rose over a fairly narrow stretch of decades, which gives it a clear generational stamp — most people who share it are young adults now rather than children.
- The underlying surname belongs to men and women alike, though in US records the given name is overwhelmingly used for girls.
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What they receive
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Mckenna
Feminine · #410 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Mckennas are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 44,000 people named Mckenna are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Mckenna in 2025?
- Mckenna ranks #410 among US girl names in 2025, with 758 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Mckenna?
- About 1 in every 2,120 US girls born in 2025 was named Mckenna — 758 in all.
- Will my child share the name Mckenna with classmates?
- Mckenna will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Mckenna
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Journey#411 · Annalise#409 · Alayah#412 · Angela#408 · Laila#413 · Brynn#407 · Lana#406 · Nalani#414
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mckenna? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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