Nehemiah
- Gender
- Male
- Meaning
- Comforted By God
- Origin
- Hebrew
About the Name Nehemiah
Nehemiah descends from the Hebrew Nechemyah meaning "comforted by Yahweh" or "Yahweh comforts." The biblical Nehemiah is the title character and putative author of the Old Testament Book of Nehemiah, which recounts his role as cupbearer to the Persian king Artaxerxes I and his subsequent leadership in rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem in the 5th century BCE after the Babylonian Exile.
The name has been used continuously in Jewish naming traditions for over two and a half millennia and across Christian Old Testament-revival traditions for centuries. Notable bearers include American politician Nehemiah Persoff (American actor, 1919–2022, the prolific American character actor); the fictional Nehemiah of various contemporary religious novels; and various American basketball players.
Nehemiah's American climb is part of the broader 21st-century return to Old Testament boys' names alongside Ezra, Asher, Isaiah, and Gideon. The name climbed from outside the US top 1000 in 1995 to the US top 300 boys' rank by 2014 and the top 300 since. The name has been driven primarily by Christian-American and African-American naming. The name's appeal sits in three contemporary American naming preferences: the Old Testament biblical-prophetic pedigree, the in-built distinctive religious-comforter register, and the popular four-syllable structure that nicknames easily. Four flowing syllables, soft consonants, and tonal warmth distinctive to Hebrew-derived naming. The name reads as both classical-biblical and contemporary American. Common nicknames Mia (back-end shortening), Miah, Nemo, and the rare Nehe each carry distinct registers; international forms include Néhémie (French, with accents), Nehemías (Spanish), Nehemia (German), Nechemia (Hebrew transliteration), and the original Hebrew Nechemyah.
Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.
Quick Facts About Nehemiah
US Popularity History (2000–2025)
Annual US births named Nehemiah by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 2010 with 932 boys named Nehemiah (boy rank #336 that year).
Where it stands today: in 2025, ranked #429 for boys (743 US births). That's 93 places below its 2010 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 Nehemiah 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 Nehemiah the strongest states are New Mexico, Hawaii, Colorado.
Strongest boys-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Mexico | #187 | 125 |
| 2 | Hawaii | #214 | 34 |
| 3 | Colorado | #316 | 196 |
| 4 | West Virginia | #322 | 18 |
| 5 | Maryland | #322 | 163 |
| 6 | Georgia | #326 | 334 |
| 7 | Florida | #335 | 524 |
| 8 | Virginia | #343 | 226 |
| 9 | North Carolina | #345 | 292 |
| 10 | Texas | #354 | 930 |
Weakest boys-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New York | #568 | 249 |
| 2 | Wisconsin | #546 | 80 |
| 3 | Oregon | #522 | 52 |
| 4 | Iowa | #521 | 54 |
| 5 | New Jersey | #512 | 135 |
| 6 | Louisiana | #511 | 95 |
| 7 | Massachusetts | #497 | 95 |
| 8 | Kentucky | #495 | 77 |
| 9 | Missouri | #494 | 116 |
| 10 | Kansas | #474 | 62 |
Source: SSA state-level baby-name dataset 2016–2025. States with fewer than 3 years of data for Nehemiah in this window are excluded. Births < 5 in a given state-year are suppressed by SSA for privacy.
Variant Forms
Looking for names like Nehemiah?
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 Nehemiah to Other Popular Names
Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Nehemiah against today's most popular boys-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).