Tahir
Masculine · “pure”
Tahir is pure in Arabic — ritually clean — and at-Tahir was one of the Prophet's sons who died in infancy.
How old is the name Tahir?
Tahir first appears in US birth records in 1972 — 53 years ago. The typical Tahir alive today was born around 2008, making them about 17 years old. About 1,900 people named Tahir are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Tahir most popular?
Tahir peaked in 1999, reaching #1671 nationally. Today it ranks #2516, 845 places below that high. See the whole 1999 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From t-h-r to Tahir
The story of Tahir
Taharah is the ritual purity required before prayer, and a whole body of Islamic law governs it; tahir is the adjective. One of the Prophet's sons who died in infancy is called at-Tahir. The name is standard across Arabic and South Asian naming and is in current American use.
Meaning
pure, clean
From the Arabic tahir, 'pure' or 'ritually clean', from the root t-h-r. Taharah is the state of ritual purity required for prayer. Fatimah is called az-Zahra and at-Tahirah. The Arabic is ordinary and the reading undisputed.
How the name formed
- t-h-r
- tahir
- Tahir
Related forms: طاهر · Tahir · Tahir
Pronouncing Tahir
TAH-hir
Two syllables, stress on the first. Arabic gives the t an emphatic quality English lacks.
Nicknames for Tahir
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
- 1972
- Most boys named
- 202388 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1671reached in 1999
- Change vs 2024
- −36.1%53 in 2025, from 83
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.
Tahir in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- طاهر in Arabic — transliteration
- Tahir in Urdu — same name
- Tahir in Turkish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: New York, Florida, California.
Tahirs among us
people named Tahir are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 32,228 born in 2025 was named Tahir
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Tahir
- #2516
- Tahir on the 2025 chart
- #869
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Tahir went to 53 boys in 2025, but Taahir is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 59, which makes it the 869th most-given boys’ name of the year — 1,647 places above the chart.
- Tahir53
- Taahir6
About 1 boy in 28,950 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 32,228 for Tahir 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 Samer test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Tahir's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Samer climbed just as high around 1979, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Samer's path sketches the road Tahir is walking now.
Tahir 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 Tahir is headed
Tahir looks set to keep climbing gently, with roughly 21% more babies a year by 2030 if the current curve holds.
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.
Tahir beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Tahir in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- That a whole body of law governs the purity the name describes is a first-rate fact.
- The pure meaning is transparent and strong.
- Two clean syllables with no pronunciation risk in English.
- The emphatic t is lost in English.
- It reads as specifically Muslim.
- The internal h is often swallowed by English speakers.
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What they receive
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Tahir
Masculine · #2516 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Tahirs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,900 people named Tahir are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Tahir?
- Tahir is the most-used spelling in US records — 53 of the 59 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Taahir.
- How popular is the name Tahir in 2025?
- Tahir ranks #2516 among US boy names in 2025, with 53 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Tahir?
- About 1 in every 32,228 US boys born in 2025 was named Tahir — 53 in all.
- Will my child share the name Tahir with classmates?
- Tahir will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Tahir
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Austen#2516 · Jariel#2516 · Neymar#2516 · Alphonse#2516 · Rye#2516 · Saleem#2516 · Stuart#2516 · Jovi#2516
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Tahir? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Tahir and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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