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Mordechai

#967 in 2025Boys' name

Literal meaning not recorded

Mordechai has been given to 6,821 babies in the U.S. since 1950. In 2025 it ranked #967 of 13,926 boys’ names in use. Its peak year was 2018, with 315 recorded.

Babies named Mordechai, 2025

1 in 13,900

Mordechai over time, 1880–2025

Boys
010020030040018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Mordechai: meaning, origin, and history

Literal meaning not recorded

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Mordechai means

Mordechai is a given name.

Origin, language, and formation

Mordechai is used in German.

Pronunciation and spelling

In German, Mordechai is pronounced /ˈmɔʁdəˌxaɪ̯/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 6,821 boys were recorded with the name Mordechai between 1950 and 2025. Its highest annual count was 315 in 2018; its best national rank was #750 in 2018.

Over 5 years its rank fell, from #877 in 2020 to #967 in 2025. Over 10 years its rank rose, from #1,104 in 2015 to #967 in 2025.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Mordechai?

Everything below is computed from the 2025 data — the most recent year available.

Among all babies, 2025
1 in 13,900
238 of 3,315,165 births
Among boys only
1 in 7,180
0.01% of boys
Rank, 2025
#967
of 13,926 boys’ names in use
Coin-flip room size
9,656 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Mordechai sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Liam (20,818)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 2025 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 5004%

Put another way: gather 9,656 children born in 2025 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Mordechai. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Mordechais were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Mordechai was born before 2010 — so the typical Mordechai is around 15 today.

Median birth year
2010
About 15 years old
Biggest decade
2010s
30.8% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
71.2%
A modern name
Recorded since 1950
6,821
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

2010s — 30.8% of all recorded uses (2,100).

Is Mordechai 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
−8
Places dropped
Rank vs 5 years ago
−90
Places dropped
Rank vs 10 years ago
+137
Places climbed
Births vs 10 years ago
1.36×
More babies than then
Share of its own peak
75.6%
Peak was 2018 (315)
Years since peak
7
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Steady
8.8% average annual change
Best rank ever
#750
2018

Spellings of Mordechai

Mordechai is the most-used spelling, taking 80.5% of the 8,471 babies given a near-identical spelling.

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 Mordechai is used

Across 1910–2025, Mordechai was most concentrated in New York — about 1 in 2,941 boys, against 1 in 10,185 across all states with data. It was least common in Pennsylvania (1 in —).

034 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1New York1 in 2,941
  2. 2New Jersey1 in 3,333
  3. 3Maryland1 in 100,000
  4. 4California1 in —
  5. 5Florida1 in —
  6. 6Illinois1 in —
  7. 7Pennsylvania1 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. Mordechai has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Mordechai around the world

Where Mordechai 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 & Wales
    1996–2025
    #1,897
    in 2025
  • Canada
    1991–2024
    #2,328
    in 2024

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics and Statistics Canada. ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence.

Notable people named Mordechai

People whose public names include Mordechai, backed by Wikidata given-name records and ordered by linked Wikimedia pages. The name may be a middle name.

People data from Wikidata (CC0). Fame is measured, not judged — the order reflects how widely each person is documented, not the U.S. birth records popularity this page is otherwise about.

Mordechai in other languages

Cross-language forms and variants of Mordechai. Linked forms have their own page here.

MordecaiMordicaiMordechaj

Variant forms from Wikidata (CC0). Most are used mainly outside the United States; U.S. birth records statistics cover US usage only.

Mordechai by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
#967
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
Down 90
Best rank ever
#750
2018
Peak year
2018
315 that year
First recorded
1950
Last recorded
2025
All-time count
6,821
Count in 2025
238

Names similar to Mordechai

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

MorrisonMordecaiMordchaiMortimerMalachaiMortonMorganMorrisMordcheMalakhaiMorrellMoroccoMakhaiKhaiAbishaiMorgenAvishaiShaiMekhaiMorleyMoritzMordchaYishaiJakhai

Names with a curve like Mordechai

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Mordechai, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

YisroelMustafaShlomoShmuelAmeerAndersYaakovMikaelYehudaYitzchokShimonTorin

Sibling names for Mordechai

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Mordechai

Top names of 2018, Mordechai's peak yearThe 2010s in fullOther names that peaked in 2018Boys' names starting with MGerman Names