Akira

Where Akira comes from

Borrowed from Japanese あきら (Akira).
— Wiktionary's entry for Akira
  • Japanese
  • Vowel-ended
Along the way
  1. 1910
    Akira Kurosawa born
    Japanese filmmaker
  2. 1955
    Akira Toriyama born
    Japanese manga artist and character designer
  3. 1973
    First appearance
    #7,435 among girls, 6 babies — the first year at least five got the name.
  4. 1982
    Mostly girls from here
    Until now more boys than girls got the name; from this year it's the other way round, and has stayed that way.
  5. 2008
    Peak, #707
    424 babies named Akira — more than any year before or since.
  6. 2019
    The fade
    The first year with half the peak's births — down to #1,145.
In the dictionary
  • A male given name from Japanese.
  • A female given name from Japanese (uncommon)
Namesakes
  • Akira Kurosawa · Japanese filmmaker, 1910–1998
  • Akira Toriyama · Japanese manga artist and character designer, 1955–2024
  • Akira Suzuki · Japanese chemist, born 1930
  • Akira Yoshino · Japanese engineer and researcher (1948-), known as an inventor of lithium-ion battery, born 1948
  • Akira Nishino · Japanese association football player and manager, born 1955

Sources: the origin note and dictionary entry are quoted from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0); the namesakes come from Wikidata (CC0); the milestones are worked out from the SSA record.