Zoei
Feminine · “life”
Zoei rewrites the tail of Zoe with an ei digraph, which is a less common device than the doubled e and produces a name that looks Scandinavian or Dutch without being either. The word underneath is one of the shortest and clearest in the Greek stock: zoe, life. Zoei appeared in numbers in the 2010s and peaked in 2014, at the tail end of Zoe's own long climb.
How old is the name Zoei?
Zoei first appears in US birth records in 1996 — 29 years ago. The typical Zoei is a kid of about 12 — this name's wave is very recent. About 1,000 people named Zoei are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Zoei most popular?
Zoei peaked in 2014, reaching #2809 nationally. Today it ranks #5722, 2,913 places below that high. See the whole 2014 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From zoe to Zoei
The story of Zoei
Zoe was in continuous use in the Greek-speaking Christian world for the whole medieval period, and the Byzantine empress Zoe Porphyrogenita, who ruled in the eleventh century, is the best-known bearer. English took the name up only in the nineteenth century, and it stayed uncommon until the 1990s, when it rose very quickly on both sides of the Atlantic and reached the American top forty. As with every name that climbs that fast, respellings followed: Zoey, Zoie, Zooey, Zoe and Zoei divide the sound. The ei is the rarest of them and the only one that does not appear in any other common English word.
Meaning
life
Greek zoe means life in the biological and the abundant sense — it is the word behind zoology and protozoa, and in the New Testament it is the term used for the life that is promised rather than the ordinary span of days. The Greek name is attested from antiquity and was borne by an early Christian martyr and by a Byzantine empress. The ei spelling is American and modern; the meaning it carries is not affected by it.
How the name formed
- zoe
- Zoe
- Zoey
- Zoei
Related forms: Zoe · Zoey · Zoie · Zoe
Pronouncing Zoei
ZOH-ee
Two syllables, stress on the first, exactly as Zoe. The ei is read as a plain ee. Readers meeting the spelling cold occasionally try ZOY, treating ei as a diphthong, which is the one hazard of this version.
Nicknames for Zoei
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
- 1996
- Most girls named
- 201461 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #2809reached in 2014
- Change vs 2024
- −12.5%21 in 2025, from 24
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.
Zoei in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Zoe in Greek — same name
- Zoey in English — spelling variant
- Zoie in English — spelling variant
- Zoe in Italian — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, Georgia, Alabama.
Zoeis among us
people named Zoei are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 76,537 born in 2025 was named Zoei
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Zoei
- #5722
- Zoei on the 2025 chart
- #81
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Zoei went to 21 girls in 2025, but Zoey is the same name said out loud. Together the 3 spellings went to 3,455, which makes it the 81st most-given girls’ name of the year — 5,641 places above the chart.
- Zoey3,427
- Zoei21
and 1 rarer spelling.
About 1 girl in 465 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 76,537 for Zoei 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 Fermina test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Zoei's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Fermina climbed just as high around 1924, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Fermina's path sketches the road Zoei is walking now.
Zoei 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
Zoei beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Zoei in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The sound is thoroughly familiar and nobody has to be taught it.
- The meaning is one word long, genuinely Greek and easy to explain.
- The spelling is rare enough that a bearer is unlikely to share it.
- Read cold, ei can produce ZOY rather than ZOH-ee.
- Zoe, Zoey and Zoie are all far more common and hers will be written as one of them.
- Autocorrect treats the spelling as an error and changes it.
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What they receive
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Zoei
Feminine · #5722 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Zoeis are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Zoei are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Zoei?
- Zoei is one of 2 recorded spellings. Zoey is the more common one — 3,427 births in 2025 against 21 for Zoei.
- How popular is the name Zoei in 2025?
- Zoei ranks #5722 among US girl names in 2025, with 21 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Zoei?
- About 1 in every 76,537 US girls born in 2025 was named Zoei — 21 in all.
- Will my child share the name Zoei with classmates?
- Zoei will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Zoei
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Rosina#5722 · Delores#5722 · Vaughn#5722 · Roseline#5722 · Loyal#5722 · Missy#5722 · Danitza#5722 · Margret#5722
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Zoei? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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