Mesiah
Masculine · “anointed one”
Mesiah is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 502 boys against 5 girls since 1880.
Mesiah is a respelling of Messiah, and the Hebrew word behind it means simply anointed — a king or priest with oil poured on his head.
How old is the name Mesiah?
Mesiah first appears in US birth records in 1999 — 26 years ago. The typical Mesiah is a kid of about 8 — this name's wave is very recent. About 500 people named Mesiah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mesiah most popular?
Mesiah peaked in 2017, reaching #2951 nationally. Today it ranks #4249, 1,298 places below that high. See the whole 2017 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From mashiach to Mesiah
The story of Mesiah
Mashiach is a job description in the Hebrew Bible before it is a title of expectation: Saul and David are anointed, and Cyrus of Persia is called anointed too. The eschatological sense developed later. Greek translated the word rather than transliterating it, which is why Christ and Messiah are the same word twice. As a given name it is recent and American.
Meaning
anointed one
From Hebrew mashiach, anointed, from a verb meaning to smear or anoint; Greek translated it as christos, which gives Christ. Anointing with oil was the ordinary way of installing a king or a high priest.
How the name formed
- mashiach
- Messiah
- Mesiah
Related forms: Messiah · Mashiach · Masih
Pronouncing Mesiah
muh-SY-ah
Three syllables with the stress in the middle. Mesiah and Messiah are said identically.
Nicknames for Mesiah
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
- 1999
- Most boys named
- 201740 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2951reached in 2017
- Change vs 2024
- +9.1%24 in 2025, from 22
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.
Mesiah in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Messiah in English — spelling variant
- Mashiach in Hebrew — same name
- Masih in Arabic — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, Georgia, Florida.
Mesiahs among us
people named Mesiah are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 71,170 born in 2025 was named Mesiah
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Mesiah
- #4249
- Mesiah on the 2025 chart
- #884
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Mesiah went to 24 boys in 2025, but Meziah and Mesiyah are the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 44, which makes it the 884th most-given boys’ name of the year — 3,365 places above the chart.
- Mesiah24
- Meziah15
- Mesiyah5
About 1 boy in 38,820 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 71,170 for Mesiah 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 Jervon test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Mesiah's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Jervon climbed just as high around 1994, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Jervon's path sketches the road Mesiah is walking now.
Mesiah 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
Mesiah beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Mesiah in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A settled meaning with a genuinely concrete original sense.
- Siah is a usable short form in current use.
- Read correctly on sight by most English speakers.
- It names a religious title of very high standing, which will draw comment.
- Messiah is the standard spelling and will be written for him.
- Some registrars and institutions have historically objected to the name.
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Mesiah
Masculine · #4249 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Mesiahs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 500 people named Mesiah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Mesiah?
- Mesiah is the most-used spelling in US records — 24 of the 44 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Meziah and Mesiyah.
- How popular is the name Mesiah in 2025?
- Mesiah ranks #4249 among US boy names in 2025, with 24 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Mesiah?
- About 1 in every 71,170 US boys born in 2025 was named Mesiah — 24 in all.
- Will my child share the name Mesiah with classmates?
- Mesiah will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Mesiah
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Guadalupe#4249 · Denny#4249 · Hughes#4249 · Erling#4249 · Rodrick#4249 · Elric#4249 · Ron#4249 · Wright#4249
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mesiah? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Mesiah and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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