Merlyn
Masculine
Merlyn is given to both — 3,410 boys and 1,635 girls since 1880. See Merlyn as a girl nameSee other names given to both
Merlin is not the Welsh name. Geoffrey of Monmouth had a wizard called Myrddin to write about in Latin, worked out that Merdinus would look bad to French-speaking readers, and changed the d to an l. The most famous wizard in the world has the name he has because of a rude French word.
How old is the name Merlyn?
Merlyn first appears in US birth records in 1908 — 117 years ago. The typical Merlyn alive today was born around 1935, making them about 90 years old. About 1,000 people named Merlyn are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Merlyn most popular?
Merlyn peaked in 1931, reaching #507 nationally. Today it ranks #10695, 10,188 places below that high. See the whole 1931 chart.
Where it comes from
From Myrddin to Merlyn
The story of Merlyn
Geoffrey wrote his history of the kings of Britain in the 1130s and made the wizard a central figure. The Latinization is the part that survives in the record: the natural Latin of Myrddin is Merdinus, and merde is French for what it is French for, so he changed it. The deeper question is whether Myrddin was ever a man. Carmarthen is Caerfyrddin in Welsh, from the Roman Moridunum, sea fort — and a legendary founder called Myrddin looks very much like a story invented to explain a town's name, which is a common enough process to have a name of its own. The wizard, in other words, may be a footnote to a place.
Meaningscholars disagree
Not established
Welsh Myrddin has no settled meaning, and the likeliest account is that it is not a personal name at all: it may come from Caerfyrddin, the town now called Carmarthen, whose name means sea fort. That would make the man a back-formation from the place, invented to explain it.
How the name formed
- Myrddin
- Merlinus
- Merlin
- Merlyn
Related forms: Myrddin · Merlin
Pronouncing Merlyn
MUR-lin
Two syllables, stress on the first. The Welsh Myrddin is closer to MUR-thin, with the dd said as the th in this. Merlin and Merlyn are identical in English speech.
Nicknames for Merlyn
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
- 1908
- Most boys named
- 1930137 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #507reached in 1931
- Change vs 2021
- 0.0%6 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.
Merlyn in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Myrddin in Welsh — same name
- Merlin in French — same name
Merlyns among us
people named Merlyn are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 284,679 born in 2025 was named Merlyn
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Merlyn
- #10695
- Merlyn on the 2025 chart
- #863
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Merlyn went to 6 boys in 2025, but Merlin is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 65, which makes it the 863rd most-given boys’ name of the year — 9,832 places above the chart.
- Merlin59
- Merlyn6
About 1 boy in 26,278 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 284,679 for Merlyn itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Hermon test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Merlyn's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Hermon climbed just as high around 1905, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Hermon's path sketches the road Merlyn is walking now.
Merlyn 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
Merlyn beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Merlyn in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- It genuinely serves either child, and the records show a near-even split.
- Two syllables that everyone reads correctly on sight.
- The history is documented down to a named author and a specific editorial decision.
- The association with the wizard is total and not something a family can shape.
- Merlin is the standard spelling and this one will be corrected toward it.
- The even split means forms and teachers will guess, and will be wrong about half the time.
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What they receive
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Merlyn
Masculine · #10695 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Merlyns are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 1,000 people named Merlyn are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Merlyn?
- Merlyn is one of 2 recorded spellings. Merlin is the more common one — 59 births in 2025 against 6 for Merlyn.
- How popular is the name Merlyn in 2025?
- Merlyn ranks #10695 among US boy names in 2025, with 6 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Merlyn?
- About 1 in every 284,679 US boys born in 2025 was named Merlyn — 6 in all.
- Will my child share the name Merlyn with classmates?
- Merlyn will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Merlyn
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Dudley#10695 · Dell#10695 · Buford#10695 · Toney#10695 · Allison#10695 · Candido#10695 · Jodie#10695 · Nora#10695
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Merlyn? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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