Kade
- Gender
- Male
- Meaning
- From The Wetlands.
- Origin
- Scottish
About the Name Kade
Kade is a modern American spelling variant of Cade (see separate entry on Cade for the Middle English cade etymology meaning "round" or "bulky," and the alternative connection to Welsh Cadell meaning "battle"). The K-spelling Kade is essentially a 1990s and 2000s American invention.
The two spellings (Kade and Cade) are tracked separately by SSA and represent the same underlying name. The Kade spelling specifically appeals to parents seeking a more visually distinctive form. The name's transition from surname to American first name accelerated through the 1990s and 2000s, riding the broader American taste for short, distinctive surname-style boys' names alongside Tate, Cade, Cole, and Drake.
Kade's American climb is recent: the name climbed from outside the US top 1000 in 2000 to the US top 300 boys' rank by 2014 and the top 300 since. Notable contemporary bearers include American football player Kade Cary; the fictional Kade of various contemporary novels; and various contemporary American social media influencers. The name's appeal sits in three contemporary American naming preferences: the surname-style sophistication, the compact one-syllable structure with the distinctive K-D consonant rhythm, and the modern visual presence with the K-spelling. The name reads as both classical-English and contemporary American. Common nicknames are scarce since the name is already short — the rare Kadey and Kadie each occasionally appear; the alternate spellings Kade, Cade (the historical spelling), and Caid have their own SSA tracking. International variants are minimal since the name is essentially modern American.
Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.
Quick Facts About Kade
US Popularity History (2000–2025)
Annual US births named Kade by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 2024 with 986 boys named Kade (boy rank #345 that year).
Where it stands today: in 2025, ranked #349 for boys (943 US births). That's 4 places below its 2024 peak.
Source: US Social Security Administration. Limitations: US birth-certificate data only; names appearing fewer than 5 times in a given year are suppressed for privacy; spelling variants are counted separately. For names that ranked outside the US top 100 before year 2000, only the years they reached the top 100 are shown — the chart may have gaps for less-popular historical names.
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Where in the US Is Kade Most Popular?
Average boy-name rank within each state across 2016–2025 SSA records. A lower number means the name appears closer to the top of that state's boys-name rankings — a per-capita measure that isn't biased toward large states. For Kade the strongest states are Wyoming, Montana, North Dakota.
Strongest boys-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wyoming | #116 | 16 |
| 2 | Montana | #168 | 66 |
| 3 | North Dakota | #174 | 72 |
| 4 | South Dakota | #183 | 46 |
| 5 | Hawaii | #188 | 66 |
| 6 | Alaska | #190 | 22 |
| 7 | West Virginia | #200 | 102 |
| 8 | Maine | #214 | 19 |
| 9 | Louisiana | #235 | 232 |
| 10 | Iowa | #238 | 154 |
Weakest boys-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Jersey | #750 | 36 |
| 2 | New York | #712 | 190 |
| 3 | Massachusetts | #592 | 48 |
| 4 | California | #559 | 505 |
| 5 | Maryland | #538 | 93 |
| 6 | Virginia | #472 | 150 |
| 7 | South Carolina | #445 | 101 |
| 8 | Texas | #428 | 703 |
| 9 | Florida | #425 | 374 |
| 10 | North Carolina | #422 | 225 |
Source: SSA state-level baby-name dataset 2016–2025. States with fewer than 3 years of data for Kade in this window are excluded. Births < 5 in a given state-year are suppressed by SSA for privacy.
Variant Forms
| Name | Meaning | Gender | Origin |
|---|---|---|---|
| Kaden | Companion | Male | Arabic |
Looking for names like Kade?
A dedicated page with 60+ related names — spelling variants, rhymes, alliterations, same-origin matches, and shared meaning concepts — lives at its own URL so each kind of similarity gets a deeper treatment than fits here.
Compare Kade to Other Popular Names
Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Kade against today's most popular boys-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).
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