Glennis
Feminine · “pure”
Glennis is given to both — 2,056 girls and 721 boys since 1880. See Glennis as a boy nameSee other names given to both
This name is Welsh and has nothing to do with a Scottish valley. Glenys comes from a Welsh adjective meaning clean, pure or holy, and the resemblance to the Gaelic word for a glen is a coincidence of two Celtic languages that separated a very long time ago and share less than people expect.
How old is the name Glennis?
Glennis first appears in US birth records in 1912 — 113 years ago. The typical Glennis alive today was born around 1943, making them about 82 years old. About 1,000 people named Glennis are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Glennis most popular?
Glennis peaked in 1939, reaching #903 nationally. See the whole 1939 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From glân to Glennis
The story of Glennis
The doubled n is what does the damage. In the Welsh spelling the name has one, and it looks Welsh; doubling it pulls the whole word toward the Scottish family of Glen, Glenn and Glenna, which is where almost every English speaker will place it on sight. That is a real cost, because the two Celtic branches are genuinely far apart — Welsh and Gaelic split before the Roman conquest and are no more mutually intelligible than English and Russian. A spelling that moves a name from one to the other is not a small adjustment. It relocates it by about two thousand years and several hundred miles.
Meaning
pure, clean
From the Welsh adjective, with an ending that makes it a name. The word is still in ordinary use in Welsh and the derivation is not disputed by anyone who works on Welsh names.
How the name formed
- glân
- Glenys
- Glennis
Related forms: Glenys
Pronouncing Glennis
GLEN-iss
Two syllables with the stress at the front. Welsh says it the same way, so the pronunciation travels intact even where the spelling does not.
Nicknames for Glennis
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1912
- Most girls named
- 194762 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #903reached in 1939
- Change vs 1991
- −14.3%6 in 1997, from 7
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Glennis in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Glenys in Welsh — same name
Glenniss among us
people named Glennis are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Glennis sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- The meaning is clean, simple and comes from a living language.
- It is a real Welsh name rather than an English approximation of one.
- The sound is easy for English speakers on first attempt.
- The doubled n makes it look Scottish, which it is not.
- Glenys and Glynis are both standard and this spelling gets corrected.
- Most children with this spelling are girls, but a real minority are boys; either may be taken for the other.
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What they receive
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Glennis
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Glenniss are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Glennis are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Glennis in 2025?
- Glennis is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Glennis with classmates?
- Glennis will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More G names
The most-given names starting with G, all years combined.
Grace#38 · Gloria#654 · Gladys#3211 · Geraldine#2438 · Gail#8362 · Gertrude#6546 · Georgia#99 · Gina#2076
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Glennis? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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