Matthew
Feminine · “gift of the Lord”
Matthew is given to boys far more often — 1,654,075 boys against 5,580 girls since 1880. See Matthew as a boy name
Matthew is a thank-you note. The Hebrew behind it, Mattityahu, is a sentence — the Lord has given — spoken by parents about the child in front of them, and it belongs to a small class of names that say something rather than describe someone. The evangelist who carried it was a tax collector before he was anything else, which the Gospel that bears his name mentions without embarrassment.
How old is the name Matthew?
Matthew first appears in US birth records in 1911 — 114 years ago. The typical Matthew alive today was born around 1984, making them about 41 years old. About 5,400 people named Matthew are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Matthew most popular?
Matthew peaked in 1983, reaching #570 nationally. Today it ranks #14942, 14,372 places below that high. See the whole 1983 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Mattityahu to Matthew
The story of Matthew
Two men in the New Testament carry versions of this name, and they are the same name in different disguises: Matthew the evangelist and Matthias, chosen by lot to replace Judas among the twelve. Greek simply shortened Mattityahu two different ways, and English inherited both as separate names without noticing they were one. Matthew came into ordinary English use after the Reformation and has never left, which is unusual — most biblical names have gone through periods of disuse and Matthew has not. It is one of a handful of names that a family choosing today and a family choosing four centuries ago would both have recognized as ordinary.
Meaning
gift of the Lord
Mattityahu joins mattat, a gift, with a short form of the divine name: the Lord's gift, or the Lord has given. It is the same construction as Jonathan and Nathaniel, built on the same verb about giving, and the same idea that Greek renders as Theodore and Dorothy. Nothing here is contested. The Greek form Matthaios lost the Hebrew ending and gained a Greek one, and every European version descends from that.
How the name formed
- Mattityahu
- Matthaios
- Mattheus
- Matthew
Related forms: Mateo · Matteo · Matthieu · Matvey · Mateusz · מַתִּתְיָהוּ
Pronouncing Matthew
MATH-yoo
MATH-yoo, two syllables, stress at the front, the th soft as in the word the. Some say MAT-yoo, dropping the th sound entirely, which is common and unremarkable. The double t is a Greek and Latin spelling inheritance and does nothing audible.
Nicknames for Matthew
High
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
- 1911
- Most girls named
- 1985294 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #570reached in 1983
- Change vs 2023
- −16.7%5 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.
Matthew in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Mateo in Spanish — same name
- Matteo in Italian — same name
- Matthieu in French — same name
- Matvey in Russian — same name
- Mateusz in Polish — same name
- מַתִּתְיָהוּ in Hebrew — transliteration
Matthews among us
people named Matthew are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 321,453 born in 2025 was named Matthew
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 Venus test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Matthew's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Venus climbed just as high around 1959, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Venus's path sketches the road Matthew is walking now.
Matthew 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
Matthew beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Matthew in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It has been in continuous ordinary use in English for four centuries without ever becoming a period marker.
- Matt is a complete working name rather than a clipping that needs the long form behind it.
- Every language that received the Gospels has a version of it, so it travels without translation.
- The meaning is a single clear sentence and it is one of the warmest a name can carry.
- Mathew with one t is a real alternative spelling, so the double t has to be given more often than the name's familiarity suggests.
- It is a name a great many people already have, and a Matthew will rarely be the only one in a room over a lifetime.
- Matt is so automatic that a family wanting the full name used will have to insist, repeatedly, and will usually lose.
- This spelling is recorded for girls too, though so rarely that a girl named Matthew will be read as a boy on every form; Mattea and Mathilda carry related sound without that.
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What they receive
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Matthew
Feminine · #14942 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Matthews 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 Matthew are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Matthew in 2025?
- Matthew ranks #14942 among US girl names in 2025, with 5 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Matthew?
- About 1 in every 321,453 US girls born in 2025 was named Matthew — 5 in all.
- Will my child share the name Matthew with classmates?
- Matthew will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Matthew
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Hester#14942 · Lyda#14942 · Zula#14942 · Zona#14942 · Ula#14942 · Belva#14942 · Lucetta#14942 · Leala#14942
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Matthew? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Matthew and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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