Muhammad still most popular boy’s name in the UK for 2023

The Islamic name Muhammad has again made it to the top spot for boy’s names in Britain this year, according to the latest statistics published by BabyCentre.

The website listed the top 100 names for both baby girls and boys for 2023, with Muhammad being the country’s most popular name, a ranking it has held onto for several years. Other spelling variants of the name such as “Mohammed” and “Mohammad” also feature in the list.

“Parents spend a lot of time thinking not only about their baby’s name but how it’s spelt. They may be small, but these differences are important to parents so we will now be including all individual baby name spellings in our charts,” Faye Mingo, spokeswoman for BabyCentre, told the Mirror.

The parenting platform now considers all spellings of a name as separate entries. This means last year’s number one girl’s name Sophia has dropped to eighth place, due to the variations in spelling. Old favourite Olivia is now back at top spot, followed by Amelia, Isla, Lily, Ava, Freya, Ivy, Sophia, Grace and Willow.

Muhammad is the top baby name in the UK again….

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— Feels Like Kevin☘️🇮🇪🌎💚 (@K4Climate) December 12, 2023

Muhammad, which means “praiseworthy” in Arabic is the name of the final prophet of Islam and is considered to be the most widely used names for boys globally, with various spellings, and often makes the top ten names in many countries around the world. There are an estimated, “ever-growing” 150 million boys and men bearing the name, notes parenting website the Bump.

READ: Muslims in Europe feel vulnerable as hostilities rise

Noah, also a prophetic name, is in second place in the boy’s list, followed by Theo, Leo, Oliver, Arthur, George, Luca, Freddie and Jack.

Other common male Muslim names were listed among the top 100 including: Ali, Abdullah, Ibrahim, Abdul, Musa, Ahmed, Yusuf, Omar, Zayn and Hamza.

For girls, Layla was the most popular Muslim name in 31st place, with other names like Maryam, Fatima, Nur, Aisha, Zahra and Raya mentioned in the index.