Micah
Feminine · “Who is like the Lord?”
Micah is given to both — 14,035 girls and 119,571 boys since 1880. See Micah as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Micah is the name of one of the Hebrew prophets, a farmer's son from the Judean lowlands whose short book of oracles has been copied and recited for roughly twenty-seven centuries. It is a question rather than a statement — the Hebrew asks "who is like the Lord?" — and it comes out of the mouth in two easy beats, MY-kuh, with the long open vowel doing most of the work.
How old is the name Micah?
Micah first appears in US birth records in 1954 — 71 years ago. The typical Micah alive today was born around 2002, making them about 23 years old. About 14,000 people named Micah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Micah most popular?
Micah peaked in 1998, reaching #582 nationally. Today it ranks #908, 326 places below that high. See the whole 1998 chart.
Where it comes from
From Mikhayahu (Micaiah) to Micah
The story of Micah
The name is Hebrew, and it reaches English through the Bible: Micah of Moresheth, active in the eighth century BC, whose prophecies fill one of the twelve minor prophetic books. Greek translators of the Hebrew scriptures wrote it Michaias, Latin made it Michaeas, and English Bibles settled on the short, direct Micah. English-speaking Protestants — Puritans especially — took biblical names beyond the familiar apostles, and Micah was among those carried into everyday use and then across the Atlantic. It stayed quiet in American records for a long stretch before the broad revival of Old Testament names lifted it, and it has been gaining ground steadily since.
Meaning
Who is like the Lord?
Micah is a shortened form of the longer Hebrew name Micaiah (Mikhayahu), which asks the same rhetorical question. Michael is built from the same question with a different word for God, which makes the two names close cousins rather than variants.
How the name formed
- MikhayahuMicaiah
- Mikhah
- MichaiasGreek
- MichaeasLatin
- Micah
Related forms: מִיכָה (Mikha) · Micha · Micha · Miha · Michaias · Miqueas
Pronouncing Micah
MY-kuh
Two syllables, stress on the first, with the long "i" of "mine". The German and Dutch form Micha is said MEE-khah, and readers who know that form — or who are thinking of the mineral mica — sometimes reach for MEE-kuh on first sight.
Nicknames for Micah
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
- 1954
- Most girls named
- 1999421 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #582reached in 1998
- Change vs 2024
- −9.6%291 in 2025, from 322
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.
Micah in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- מִיכָה (Mikha) in Hebrew — transliteration
- Micha in German — same name
- Micha in Dutch — same name
- Miha in Slovene — same name
- Michaias in Greek — same name
- Miqueas in Spanish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Florida.
Micahs among us
people named Micah are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 5,523 born in 2025 was named Micah
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Micah
- #908
- Micah on the 2025 chart
- #486
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Micah went to 291 girls in 2025, but Mika, Myka and Mykah and the rest below are the same name said out loud. Together the 7 spellings went to 555, which makes it the 486th most-given girls’ name of the year — 422 places above the chart.
About 1 girl in 2,896 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 5,523 for Micah 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 Violette test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Micah's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Violette climbed just as high around 1908, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Violette's path sketches the road Micah is walking now.
Micah 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 Micah is headed
Micah should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
Medium 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.
Micah beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Micah in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Standard English Bible spelling, so it is already in print in most households and rarely needs to be spelled out letter by letter.
- Short, two syllables, and complete on its own — it works in full from the crib to a résumé without needing a nickname.
- A documented record stretching back to the eighth century BC, with an unbroken written line through Greek, Latin and English scripture.
- Recognizable across languages, with settled forms in German, Dutch, Slovene and Spanish.
- The MY-kuh / MEE-kuh split is real, and a Micah will correct people occasionally throughout life. The correction is quick, but it does not stop happening.
- The sound is shared with Mika, Myka, Micaiah and Michaela, so expect the odd misspelling from people who have only heard it.
- It has been climbing for years, so a Micah born now is likely to meet more namesakes at school than the current figures would suggest — still not a class full, but no longer a curiosity.
- In US records this spelling goes overwhelmingly to boys. A girl named Micah will meet forms and teachers that assume otherwise, which is manageable but worth knowing in advance.
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What they receive
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Micah
Feminine · #908 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Micahs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 14,000 people named Micah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Micah?
- Micah is the most-used spelling in US records — 291 of the 555 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Mika, Myka, Mykah, Mikah, Mica and Mycah.
- How popular is the name Micah in 2025?
- Micah ranks #908 among US girl names in 2025, with 291 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Micah?
- About 1 in every 5,523 US girls born in 2025 was named Micah — 291 in all.
- Will my child share the name Micah with classmates?
- Micah will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Micah
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Teresa#908 · Greta#908 · Stormi#908 · Nataly#907 · Kollyns#904 · Bennett#912 · Rayne#904 · Khalani#904
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Micah? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Micah and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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