Omari
Masculine · “flourishing”
Omari is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 13,158 boys against 399 girls since 1880.
Omari is the Swahili form of the Arabic name Umar, carried down the East African coast by centuries of trade and settled into a shape that ends, like so many Swahili names, in a soft open vowel. In American records it is a fairly recent arrival, most at home in the South, and it says its three syllables cleanly the first time: oh-MAR-ee.
How old is the name Omari?
Omari first appears in US birth records in 1971 — 54 years ago. The typical Omari is a kid of about 12 — this name's wave is very recent. About 13,000 people named Omari are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Omari most popular?
Omari peaked in 2018, reaching #471 nationally. Today it ranks #686, 215 places below that high. See the whole 2018 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From ʿUmar to Omari
The story of Omari
The parent name is Arabic ʿUmar, borne by the second caliph, Umar ibn al-Khattab, in the seventh century — which made it one of the most widely given names in the Muslim world. Swahili, the trade language of the East African coast, reshaped many Arabic names to fit its own sound pattern, and ʿUmar became Omari, standard in Tanzania and Kenya to this day. It reached American records much later than plain Omar, and its strongest footholds here are in Florida, Texas and Georgia. So the name arrives with two histories layered on top of each other: Arabic in root, East African in form.
Meaning
flourishing, long-lived
The name traces to the Arabic root ʿ-m-r, tied to ʿumr, 'life, lifespan' — hence the usual reading of thriving or long-lived. Some baby-name lists attach unrelated glosses to the Swahili spelling; the Arabic derivation is the documented one.
How the name formed
- ʿUmar
- Omar
- Omari
Related forms: Umar / ʿUmar · Omari · Omar · Ömer · Omer · Umaru
Pronouncing Omari
oh-MAR-ee
Stress falls on the middle syllable. A flatter OH-mah-ree is also heard, closer to the Swahili rhythm, where syllables carry more evenly.
Nicknames for Omari
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
- 1971
- Most boys named
- 2018618 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #471reached in 2018
- Change vs 2024
- −14.6%397 in 2025, from 465
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.
Omari in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Umar / ʿUmar in Arabic — same name
- Omari in Swahili — same name
- Omar in English, Spanish — same name
- Ömer in Turkish — same name
- Omer in Bosnian — same name
- Umaru in Hausa — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Florida, Texas, Georgia.
Omaris among us
people named Omari are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 4,302 born in 2025 was named Omari
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 Nicky test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Omari's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Nicky climbed just as high around 1959, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Nicky's path sketches the road Omari is walking now.
Omari 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 Omari is headed
Omari 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.
Omari beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Omari in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Reads correctly on first sight for most English speakers — three plain syllables, no silent letters, one obvious spelling.
- Already familiar by association with Omar, so it needs no explaining while remaining distinct.
- Works across Arabic, Swahili, Turkish and English-speaking settings, with a recognized equivalent in each.
- Uncommon enough in American classrooms that a child is unlikely to share it with a peer.
- Amari is a well-established name in the US and sounds close enough that mix-ups on rosters, in email and over the phone are likely. Worth deciding early how much correcting you want to do.
- People who know Omar will often default to it, so the fuller form may need repeating — friendly, but persistent.
- Through its Arabic root the name carries a strong association with early Islamic history. Many families choose it purely for its East African form, but some listeners will read a religious signal into it.
- Its American wave is recent and now easing back, so the name currently sits mostly among children and young people rather than across all ages.
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What they receive
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Omari
Masculine · #686 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Omaris are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 13,000 people named Omari are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Omari in 2025?
- Omari ranks #686 among US boy names in 2025, with 397 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Omari?
- About 1 in every 4,302 US boys born in 2025 was named Omari — 397 in all.
- Will my child share the name Omari with classmates?
- Omari will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Omari
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Briar#686 · Westin#688 · Dereck#688 · Peyton#683 · Taylor#683 · Jasiel#683 · Donald#690 · Shawn#681
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Omari? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Omari and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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