Jermaine
Masculine · “brother”
Jermaine is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 42,027 boys against 967 girls since 1880. See Jermaine as a girl name
Jermaine is a French name wearing an English coat. The sound is French all the way through; the spelling is what English does when it hears that sound and reaches for a letter it already trusts. The result has been a fixture of American naming for three generations and does not read as borrowed at all.
How old is the name Jermaine?
Jermaine first appears in US birth records in 1953 — 72 years ago. The typical Jermaine alive today was born around 1984, making them about 41 years old. About 40,000 people named Jermaine are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Jermaine most popular?
Jermaine peaked in 1973, reaching #127 nationally. Today it ranks #1492, 1,365 places below that high. See the whole 1973 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Latin germanus, a full brother, becomes a personal name to Jermaine
The story of Jermaine
Germain, bishop of Paris in the sixth century, was buried in an abbey outside the city walls that eventually took his name. Saint-Germain-des-Prés is generally reckoned the oldest church in Paris — the tower has stood since the eleventh century and parts of the foundation are older still — and the quarter that grew up around it kept the name into modern life, so that a bishop dead fourteen hundred years is still the address of a Paris neighborhood. That is where the name comes from. What English did to it was change one letter. French writes Germain and says the g softly, the way the middle of measure sounds; English has a letter for a related sound already, and wrote it J. The spelling change is the whole difference between the French name and the American one, and it is why Jermaine looks unrelated to Germaine on the page while sounding almost identical.
Meaning
brother
The Latin word behind the name, germanus, described a full brother — a sibling of the same two parents, as opposed to a half-brother — and it produced a saint's name in France as Germain and Germaine. English took the French name, not the Latin one, which is why the sound is French and the spelling is not. The derivation itself is not in dispute; it simply looks nothing like the name once it has passed through two languages and an American spelling.
How the name formed
- Latin germanus, a full brother, becomes a personal name
- Sixth century: Germain is bishop of Paris
- The abbey named after him becomes the oldest church in the city
- French Germain reaches English-speaking use
- English respells the soft g as J, giving Jermaine
Related forms: Germain · Germaine · Germano · Germán
Pronouncing Jermaine
jer-MAYN
Two syllables with the stress firmly on the second — the first is barely more than a breath. Saying it JER-mayne, with the weight at the front, marks a speaker out immediately as someone who has only read the name.
Nicknames for Jermaine
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
- 1953
- Most boys named
- 19732,038 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #127reached in 1973
- Change vs 2024
- −4.1%118 in 2025, from 123
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.
Jermaine in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Germain in French — same name
- Germaine in French — related form
- Germano in Italian — related form
- Germán in Spanish — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Florida, Texas, Georgia.
Jermaines among us
people named Jermaine are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 14,475 born in 2025 was named Jermaine
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Abraham test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Jermaine's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Abraham climbed just as high around 1911, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Abraham's path sketches the road Jermaine is walking now.
Jermaine sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Jermaine is headed
Jermaine is easing off slowly — about 20% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
High confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Jermaine beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Jermaine in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Established in American use for three generations, so it is familiar without being crowded
- A clear, confident rhythm that carries across a room
- Real French and Latin history behind it, easily explained in a sentence
- The short form Jerm sounds exactly like germ, and children find that quickly whether or not adults use it.
- This spelling is recorded for daughters as well as sons; a girl carrying it will meet the assumption of a boy on every written list.
- The name is stepping back from a peak it reached decades ago, so it reads as belonging to a particular American generation.
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What they receive
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Jermaine
Masculine · #1492 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Jermaines are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 40,000 people named Jermaine are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Jermaine in 2025?
- Jermaine ranks #1492 among US boy names in 2025, with 118 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Jermaine?
- About 1 in every 14,475 US boys born in 2025 was named Jermaine — 118 in all.
- Will my child share the name Jermaine with classmates?
- Jermaine will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Jermaine
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Efrain#1492 · Arjan#1492 · Kyair#1492 · Davi#1492 · Nickolas#1492 · Jassiel#1492 · Ziggy#1486 · Finnian#1486
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Jermaine? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Jermaine and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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