AkanGhanaianFriday-born
Meaning: born on a Friday.
Kofi
| Origin | Akan (Twi and Fante) of Ghana — one of the seven male day-names |
|---|---|
| Meaning | Born on a Friday, from Fiada, the Akan Friday |
| Pronunciation | KOH-fee, both syllables clean and even; not koh-FEE |
| Popularity | Outside the current U.S. top 100; an ordinary name in Ghana and the best-known Akan name abroad after Kwame |
| Variants | Koffi (Togo and Côte d'Ivoire), Kwafi, Fiifi (Fante diminutive), Cuffee, Cuffe and Cuffy in the Americas |
| Nicknames | Fiifi in Fante households; the name is short enough that most bearers keep it whole |
| Diaspora forms | Cuffee, Cuffe, Cuffy and Coffee, recorded across the Caribbean and North America |
History & meaning
Kofi is Friday. Akan children are named for the weekday of their birth — a complete seven-name system for boys and a parallel one for girls, set out in full on our Kwame page — and a boy born on Fiada is Kofi from the first day of his life. Friday in Akan tradition belongs to the wanderer and the provider: the day-born character is restless, generous and drawn outward, and Fante communities on the coast associate Friday with the sea and keep it as a rest day for fishermen. Kofi Annan's full name shows how the rest of an Akan name is built. Kofi Atta Annan: Atta marks a twin, and he had one, his sister Efua Atta, whose day-name — Efua in Fante, Afua in Twi — says she was born the same Friday.
Kofi also has a second life on the other side of the Atlantic. Akan people were among those shipped from the Gold Coast in large numbers during the eighteenth century, and their day-names survive in colonial registers, wills and runaway notices in anglicised spellings — Cuffee, Cuffe, Cuffy, Coffee. Cuffy, remembered in Guyana as Kofi, led the Berbice rebellion of 1763 and is a national hero there. Paul Cuffe, the Quaker shipowner and abolitionist of Massachusetts, was the son of an Ashanti man recorded as Kofi Slocum, and took his father's day-name as the family surname. The name was never lost; it was written down in English.
Why parents choose it
Two syllables, no ambiguity in spelling or sound, and a plain honest meaning. For Ghanaian families abroad it keeps the calendar intact; for others it is a short African name that an English speaker gets right first time.
Middle names for Kofi
The Akan pattern puts a personal name after the day-name, and Kofi's rounded ending takes a longer partner well: Kofi Emmanuel, Kofi Sebastian, Kofi Abraham, Kofi Nathaniel. See the middle names guide for pairing by rhythm.
Famous Kofis
Kofi Annan, born in Kumasi on Friday 8 April 1938, was Secretary-General of the United Nations from 1997 to 2006 and shared the 2001 Nobel Peace Prize. Kofi Abrefa Busia, an Oxford-trained sociologist, served as Prime Minister of Ghana from 1969 to 1972. The Ghanaian-born wrestler Kofi Kingston, born Kofi Sarkodie-Mensah, won the WWE Championship in 2019.
Consider instead
For the same system on a different day, Kwame is Saturday and Kwabena is Tuesday. If you like the idea of a day-name but want the Swahili version of it, Juma also marks a Friday birth, by way of Arabic.