Tarik
Masculine · “the night visitor”
Tarik is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 4,181 boys against 11 girls since 1880.
Tarik is an Arabic name about arriving at night — the one who knocks at the door after dark — and by extension the morning star, which appears when everything else has gone. A chapter of the Qur'an carries the word.
How old is the name Tarik?
Tarik first appears in US birth records in 1958 — 67 years ago. The typical Tarik alive today was born around 1995, making them about 30 years old. About 4,000 people named Tarik are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Tarik most popular?
Tarik peaked in 1978, reaching #795 nationally. Today it ranks #3240, 2,445 places below that high. See the whole 1978 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From tariq to Tarik
The story of Tarik
The name is old in Arabic and carries a striking double image — a traveler at the door and a star in the dark. Its best-known bearer was the commander who crossed from North Africa into Iberia in 711 and gave his name to the rock he landed at: Jabal Tariq, Tariq's mountain, which Europe pronounces Gibraltar. The name is used across the Arab world, in Turkey as Tarık and in the Balkans as Tarik, and it reaches American records from all of them.
Meaning
the night visitor; the morning star
From an Arabic verb meaning to knock or to strike; a tariq is one who arrives at night and must knock to be let in, and the word is used in the Qur'an for a bright star that pierces the darkness.
How the name formed
- tariq
- Tarik
Related forms: Tariq · Tarık · Tarik · Tariq
Pronouncing Tarik
TAH-rik
Two syllables, first stressed. Arabic gives a fuller second vowel, tah-REEK.
Nicknames for Tarik
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
- 1958
- Most boys named
- 1997150 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #795reached in 1978
- Change vs 2024
- +2.9%36 in 2025, from 35
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.
Tarik in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Tariq in Arabic — spelling variant
- Tarık in Turkish — same name
- Tarik in Bosnian — same name
- Tariq in Urdu — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Tariks among us
people named Tarik are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 47,447 born in 2025 was named Tarik
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Tarik
- #3240
- Tarik on the 2025 chart
- #785
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Tarik went to 36 boys in 2025, but Tariq is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 143, which makes it the 785th most-given boys’ name of the year — 2,455 places above the chart.
- Tariq107
- Tarik36
About 1 boy in 11,945 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 47,447 for Tarik 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 Robbin test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Tarik's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Robbin climbed just as high around 1954, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Robbin's path sketches the road Tarik is walking now.
Tarik 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 Tarik is headed
Tarik 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.
Tarik beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Tarik 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 two vivid images attached to it, one domestic and one astronomical.
- Five letters and two syllables, read correctly by English speakers at first sight.
- Recognized across the Arab world, Turkey and the Balkans.
- Tariq is the more usual Arabic transliteration and will be offered as a correction.
- The stress differs between English and Arabic readings.
- The Gibraltar connection is real and delightful and almost nobody knows it.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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Tarik
Masculine · #3240 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Tariks are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 4,000 people named Tarik are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Tarik?
- Tarik is one of 2 recorded spellings. Tariq is the more common one — 107 births in 2025 against 36 for Tarik.
- How popular is the name Tarik in 2025?
- Tarik ranks #3240 among US boy names in 2025, with 36 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Tarik?
- About 1 in every 47,447 US boys born in 2025 was named Tarik — 36 in all.
- Will my child share the name Tarik with classmates?
- Tarik will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Tarik
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Eugenio#3240 · Pace#3240 · Stoney#3240 · Dany#3240 · Rasheed#3240 · Abdirahman#3240 · Mykah#3240 · Lowell#3240
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Tarik? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Tarik and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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