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Melvyn

Masculine · “bad settlement”

Melvyn is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 4,360 boys against 10 girls since 1880.

1912high 1938
Rare todaygiven to only a few children a year
rare

Melvyn is Melvin with a y, and the surname behind it is Scottish — from Melville, a Norman place name that means the bad settlement, which is an unusually frank thing to call a village.

How old is the name Melvyn?

Melvyn first appears in US birth records in 1912 — 113 years ago. The typical Melvyn alive today was born around 1941, making them about 84 years old. About 1,800 people named Melvyn are estimated to be alive in the US today.

When was the name Melvyn most popular?

Melvyn peaked in 1938, reaching #323 nationally. See the whole 1938 chart.

Compare this nameMore “M” names

Lists built from the same records:

I

Where it comes from

The story of Melvyn

De Malleville families came to Scotland after the Norman conquest and gave their name to Melville in Midlothian. The surname became a given name in the nineteenth century, and Melvin rose sharply in twentieth-century America. The y spelling stayed commoner in Britain than in America, where Melvyn peaked around 1938.

Meaningscholars disagree

bad settlement

Usually read through Melville, from the Norman French mal ville, 'bad town' or 'poor settlement'. A second route runs through the Gaelic Maolmhin, 'smooth brow'. The unflattering French reading is the better documented one, and place names of that kind are commoner than one might expect.

How the name formed

  1. mal ville
  2. Melville
  3. Melvin
  4. Melvyn

Related forms: Melvin · Melville · Maolmhin

Pronouncing Melvyn

MEL-vin

Two syllables, stress on the first. Melvyn and Melvin are said identically.

Nicknames for Melvyn

Moderate

MelThe standard clipping, and a name in its own right for both sexes
VinThe back of the name, and a modern short form with its own currency
II

What the data says

The long climb, and where it stands now

BOYS NAMED · 1912–20252931470293519122023

US babies named Melvyn per year from 1912 to 2025
AVERAGE RANK BY DECADE#1#10#100#1000#3231910s2020s

The same years in position rather than babies

First recorded
1912
Most boys named
1938293 — the highest on record
Peak rank
#323reached in 1938
Change vs 2021
−54.5%5 in 2023, from 11
Melvyn sits in the rare tail. Its best year on record was 1938, with 293 boys. Today it is given to few enough children that it does not enter the ranked charts at all.

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.

Melvyn in other languages

The same name elsewhere

  • Melvin in English — spelling variant
  • Melville in Scottish — related form
  • Maolmhin in Gaelic — related form

Melvyns among us

1,800

people named Melvyn are estimated to be alive in the US today

Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method

III

Is it right for you

Fashion outlook

Melvyn 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

Practical strengths
  • A documented Norman-Scottish family and a real place stand behind it.
  • Mel and Vin are two short forms at very different registers.
  • The frankly unflattering place name is a genuinely good story.
What to consider
  • Melvin is much the commoner spelling in America.
  • The origin is split between a French place name and a Gaelic descriptor.
  • It is strongly period-coded to the middle of the twentieth century.

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Melvyn

Masculine

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Frequently asked

How many Melvyns are there in the world?
No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,800 people named Melvyn are estimated to be alive in the US today.
How popular is the name Melvyn in 2025?
Melvyn is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
Will my child share the name Melvyn with classmates?
Melvyn 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 Melvyn? See the current top 100.

Choosing between Melvyn and another name?

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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology

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