Mary
Masculine · “bitter”
Mary is given to girls far more often — 4,141,481 girls against 15,173 boys since 1880. See Mary as a girl name
Mary given to a son is not an error in the records. Catholic families across Europe and the Americas gave Marian names to boys as a devotion — Jean-Marie in France, José María in Spain — and American registers carry the practice plainly.
How old is the name Mary?
Mary was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Mary alive today was born around 1936, making them about 89 years old. About 5,400 people named Mary are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mary most popular?
Mary peaked in 1897, reaching #211 nationally. See the whole 1897 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Miryam to Mary
The story of Mary
Devotion to the Virgin produced a naming practice with no equivalent for any other figure: boys given Marie or María as a second name, and sometimes as a first. France produced Jean-Marie and Marie-Joseph as ordinary men's names; Spain and Latin America produced José María and Ana María's masculine counterparts. American Catholic and immigrant families carried the practice with them, and Mary appears in the boys' registers in real numbers into the early twentieth century.
Meaningscholars disagree
bitter; beloved; sea
From the Hebrew Miryam, whose meaning is among the most argued-over in the field. 'Bitter', 'beloved', 'rebellious' and an Egyptian element meaning beloved have all been proposed, and none has won. The name's importance has never depended on settling it.
How the name formed
- Miryam
- Maria
- Mary
Related forms: Marie · María · Maria · Máire
Pronouncing Mary
MAIR-ee
Two syllables, stress on the first, in American English. The French Marie is ma-REE and the Spanish María is ma-REE-ah, both stressed differently.
Nicknames for Mary
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
- 1880
- Most boys named
- 1931325 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #211reached in 1897
- Change vs 2010
- 0.0%5 in 2020, from 5
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.
Mary in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Marie in French — same name
- María in Spanish — same name
- Maria in Italian — same name
- Máire in Irish — related form
Marys among us
people named Mary 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
Mary has already lived its whole cycle: it rose, had its era, and has stepped off the charts. The fashion question is behind it — what lies ahead is the waiting room where revivals begin, once a name's first generation has grown distant enough for it to sound fresh again.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- It is the most widely given woman's name in European history, with an unmatched documented record.
- The masculine devotional tradition is genuine, long-established and international.
- Marion and Mario are both available as forms that read as masculine in English.
- In English the name reads as unambiguously feminine, whatever the devotional tradition.
- The meaning of the underlying Hebrew is genuinely unsettled.
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What they receive
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Mary
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Marys are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 5,400 people named Mary are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Mary in 2025?
- Mary is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Mary with classmates?
- Mary will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More M names
The most-given names starting with M, all years combined.
Michael#21 · Matthew#32 · Mark#244 · Mason#39 · Martin#335 · Marvin#699 · Melvin#958 · Marcus#258
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mary? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Mary and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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