Mattew
Masculine · “Hebrew Mattityahu”
A tax collector in the Gospels was not a civil servant. He was a contractor who had bid for the right to collect tolls in a district and kept whatever he could extract above his bid, which is why the word publican appears in the same breath as sinner.
How old is the name Mattew?
Mattew first appears in US birth records in 1925 — 100 years ago. The typical Mattew alive today was born around 1987, making them about 38 years old. About 1,200 people named Mattew are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mattew most popular?
Mattew peaked in 1987, reaching #1283 nationally. Today it ranks #9714, 8,431 places below that high. See the whole 1987 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Mattityahu to Mattew
The story of Mattew
Rome farmed out indirect taxes and tolls to contractors, who paid a fixed sum for the concession and recovered it, with as much extra as they could manage, from travelers and traders. The system was open to abuse by design, and the men who ran it were despised on two grounds at once: they were extortionate and they worked for an occupying power. That is why the Gospels pair publicans with sinners as a standing phrase, and why the call of Matthew from his toll booth is presented as scandalous. The Greek word telones means a collector of tolls specifically, not an assessor of income. Zacchaeus in Luke is described as a chief among them, which meant he subcontracted to others. The point of the stories is precisely the social position of the men involved, and translating the word as tax collector loses most of it.
Meaning
Hebrew Mattityahu, gift of Yah
Mattew is a respelling of Matthew, from Hebrew Mattityahu, joining mattan, a gift, to Yahu, the divine name. The dropped h is an American simplification with no effect on the sound. Matthew is identified in the Gospel bearing his name as a tax collector called from his booth. The peak of this spelling is 1987.
How the name formed
- Mattityahu
- Matthaios
- Matthew
- Mattew
Related forms: Matthew · Mattityahu · Mateo
Pronouncing Mattew
MATH-yoo
Two syllables, stress on the first. Mattew and Matthew are homophones; the missing h changes nothing in speech.
Nicknames for Mattew
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
- 1925
- Most boys named
- 198758 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1283reached in 1987
- Change vs 2024
- +16.7%7 in 2025, from 6
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.
Mattew in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Matthew in English — spelling variant
- Mattityahu in Hebrew — same name
- Mateo in Spanish — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: New York.
Mattews among us
people named Mattew are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 244,011 born in 2025 was named Mattew
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 Lajuan test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Mattew's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Lajuan climbed just as high around 1972, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Lajuan's path sketches the road Mattew is walking now.
Mattew 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
Mattew beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Mattew in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Matt and Matty are both established short forms.
- The name has three thousand years of documented history.
- Two syllables with a firm first-syllable stress.
- Matthew is overwhelmingly the standard spelling.
- The missing h will be treated as an error.
- Systems and readers will correct it.
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What they receive
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Mattew
Masculine · #9714 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Mattews are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,200 people named Mattew are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Mattew in 2025?
- Mattew ranks #9714 among US boy names in 2025, with 7 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Mattew?
- About 1 in every 244,011 US boys born in 2025 was named Mattew — 7 in all.
- Will my child share the name Mattew with classmates?
- Mattew will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Mattew
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Vern#9714 · Abrahm#9714 · Sid#9714 · Hartwell#9714 · Kwan#9714 · Adrean#9714 · Chancey#9714 · Bob#9714
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mattew? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Mattew and another name?
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Your gut first, the numbers after — the split shows once you pick.
US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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