Chay
UnisexBoys' nameGirls' nameMeaning not yet documented
Chay has been given to 429 babies in the U.S. since 1972. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1992, with 17 recorded. It's used for both sexes: 87% boys, 13% girls all-time.
Babies named Chay, 2016
1 in 459,000
Chay over time, 1880–2025
Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.
Girls or boys — Chay over time
In 2016, Chay went to 0% girls and 100% boys.
A sex is only published in years it reached five applications, so a stretch at 0% or 100% means the other side stayed under that floor — not that it was never used.
How common is Chay?
Chay had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2016, the last year it was published.
- Among all babies, 2016
- 1 in 459,000
- 8 of 3,669,531 births
- Among boys only
- 1 in 237,000
- <0.01% of boys
- Rank, 2016
- Unranked
- Fewer than 5 uses
- Coin-flip room size
- 317,942 kids
- Even odds of a second one
Where Chay sits on the popularity scale
Chance at least one other child shares the name
If the other children were drawn at random from the 2016 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.
Put another way: gather 317,942 children born in 2016 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Chay. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.
When Chays were born
Half of everyone ever recorded as Chay was born before 1991 — so the typical Chay is around 34 today.
- Biggest decade
- 1990s
- 28.8% of all use
- Born in the last 25 years
- 48.8%
- Spread across generations
- Recorded since 1950
- 375
- People you could plausibly meet
1990s — 28.8% of all recorded uses (108).
Is Chay rising or falling?
Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.
- Rank vs 1 year ago
- —
- Not ranked then
- Rank vs 5 years ago
- New entry
- Not ranked then
- Rank vs 10 years ago
- —
- Not ranked then
- Births vs 10 years ago
- —
- Not published both years
- Share of its own peak
- 0%
- Peak was 1992 (17)
- Years since peak
- 33
- Years
- Year-to-year steadiness
- Volatile
- 25.9% average annual change
Spellings of Chay
Chay is not the most common spelling — Cody is, with 19.4% against Chay's 0.02%.
Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.
Where Chay is used
Across 1910–2025, Chay was most concentrated in California — about 1 in — boys, against 1 in 3,486,540 across all states with data.
Most concentrated
- 1California1 in —
Shading is the share of that state's recorded boys given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Chay has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.
Chay around the world
Where Chay ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.
- England & Wales1996–2024#5,120in 2024
- Scotland1994–2019#701in 2019
- South Australia1979–2003#588in 2003
Popularity data from Office for National Statistics, National Records of Scotland and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). ONS, NRS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.
Chay by the numbers
The raw record for each sex the name is used for.
As a boy's name
Names similar to Chay
Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.
Sibling names for Chay
Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.