Makai

girls:

310 births since 1997

#5406 (5th percentile)

boys:

8.1k births since 1989

#1309 (71st percentile)

overall:

8.4k births since 1989

#2944 (62nd percentile)

Popularity Trends

The name Makai is the #2,944 most popular name of all time in the U.S. on a gender-neutral basis, with a total of 8,414 recorded births since 1989. This represents the 62.0% percentile of name popularity (more popular than 62.0% of all names). For boys, it ranks #1,309 (71.5% percentile) for all time with 8,104 births since 1989. For girls, it ranks #5,406 (5.4% percentile) for all time with 310 births since 1997.

Makai first appeared in U.S. birth records in 1989 (1989 for boys and 1997 for girls). Birth data for Makai is available in 31 out of the 35 years between 1989 and 2023 (31 years for boys and 26 years for girls). The Social Security Administration only reports birth data for years in which the name was given to at least five children of the same gender.

The name Makai has been given almost exclusively to boys, with 96.3% of all recorded births being male.

For boys, Makai reached its peak popularity in 2023, achieving the 51.5% percentile (ranked #442) with 332 births per million. The name was most common in 2023, with 332 births per million (ranked 51.5% percentile). Over the past 5 years, the popularity of this name for boys has been increasing. Currently, Makai is at or near its peak popularity for boys, ranked #442 (51.5% percentile) with 332 births per million.

For girls, Makai reached its peak popularity in 2005, achieving the 1.8% percentile (ranked #922) with 11 births per million. The name was most common in 2011, with 11 births per million (ranked 1.8% percentile). Since reaching a high point in 2020, the popularity of this name for girls has been declining. Currently, Makai ranks #941 for girls (0.6% percentile) with 6 births per million, which is 55.4% of its peak share of births.

This chart shows the total number of births per million babies in each year for the name "Makai".

1989 2023 19892023

Key Statistics

Total Births
310
Peak Births
22
Peak Year
2005
First Recorded
1997
Peak Percentile
1.8%
Current Percentile
0.6%
Peak Rank
#922
Current Rank
#941
Female statistics
Total Births
8,104
Peak Births
608
Peak Year
2023
First Recorded
1989
Peak Percentile
51.5%
Current Percentile
51.5%
Peak Rank
#442
Current Rank
#442
Male statistics

How to Pronounce Makai

Our model found one way to pronounce the name Makai. Click the play button under each pronunciation to hear it spoken aloud.

Our model is 100.0% confident that Makai is pronounced as muh-KAI, which has 2 syllables.

2
100.0%

Possible Additional Pronunciations

If none of the pronunciations above sound right to you, could you please check whether any of these related pronunciations should be applied to the name Makai? These are pronunciations that other similar names use, but which are not currently associated with Makai. If you think any of these are valid pronunciations for Makai, please vote using the thumbs up button.

About Pronunciation Data

Our confidence scores estimate the likelihood that a particular pronunciation is the most correct for a given name spelling. These scores are derived from pronunciation dictionaries, manual verification, your feedback, and a fine-tuned large language model trained to generate name pronunciations.

For any given spelling, confidence scores across all identified pronunciations sum to 100%. However, these scores don't account for the possibility of valid pronunciations that our model hasn't identified.

The raw pronunciations shown (like M AH0 K AY1) use the ARPAbet phoneme system, a standardized way to represent English speech sounds. Each symbol represents a distinct sound in American English. Visit the ARPAbet Wikipedia page to learn more about these phonetic symbols.

Pronunciation audio is generated by an open source text to speech model that has been customized to adhere to pronunciations provided in ARPAbet format, but sometimes pronunciations that differ subtly will sound identical, particularly if the only difference is the level of emphasis on a syllable or a single vowel sound.

© 2025 NamePlay.org

Made with ❤️ by Aaron J Becker