Mykel
Feminine · “who is like God?”
Mykel is given to both — 713 girls and 3,444 boys since 1880. See Mykel as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Mykel changes two letters of one of the oldest names in the Western world and neither change can be heard. The name belongs to an archangel who appears on more English coins than any monarch, and one of those coins was used as medicine.
How old is the name Mykel?
Mykel first appears in US birth records in 1975 — 50 years ago. The typical Mykel alive today was born around 1998, making them about 27 years old. About 700 people named Mykel are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Mykel most popular?
Mykel peaked in 1991, reaching #3207 nationally. See the whole 1991 chart.
Where it comes from
From Mikha'el to Mykel
The story of Mykel
English kings minted a gold coin for two centuries with the archangel on it, spearing a dragon, and it was called the angel for that reason. Its second job was medical. The king was believed to cure scrofula — swollen glands of the neck, called the King's Evil — by touching the sufferer, and the ceremony ended with the monarch hanging one of these coins on a ribbon round the patient's neck to be worn continuously. Demand was enormous; thousands attended in a single reign, the coins were minted specially for it once the currency version had gone out of use, and people sold or pawned theirs, which rather undercut the theory. The practice stopped in England in the early eighteenth century, when a new dynasty declined to do it and called it superstition, though it continued in France for longer. Samuel Johnson was touched as a child and kept the coin all his life.
Meaning
who is like God?
The Hebrew name is a question rather than a statement, built from three words: who, like, and a form of the divine name. It is a rhetorical question with an implied answer of nobody, which is why it belongs to an archangel and not to an ordinary man in the text.
How the name formed
- Mikha'el
- Michael
- Mykel
Related forms: Miguel · Michele · Mikhail · Michał · Mihály · Mícheál
Pronouncing Mykel
MY-kul
Two syllables with the stress at the front. The k does the job the ch does in the standard spelling, and the y the job of the i; both are visible on the page and audible nowhere.
Nicknames for Mykel
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
- 1975
- Most girls named
- 199736 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #3207reached in 1991
- Change vs 2022
- +16.7%7 in 2023, 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.
Mykel in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Miguel in Spanish — same name
- Michele in Italian — same name
- Mikhail in Russian — same name
- Michał in Polish — same name
- Mihály in Hungarian — same name
- Mícheál in Irish — same name
Mykels among us
people named Mykel 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
Mykel 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
- The name behind it is understood in every European language without translation.
- Mikey and Myke are both ready-made and cover different registers.
- The spelling removes the ch that makes the standard version look harder than it is.
- Michael is overwhelmingly the standard spelling and this will be corrected for a lifetime.
- Both changed letters are silent, so the spelling must be given aloud every time.
- The record holds it for daughters too, though far fewer, so it is not an exclusive signal.
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What they receive
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Mykel
Feminine
Frequently asked
- How many Mykels are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 700 people named Mykel are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Mykel in 2025?
- Mykel is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 girl names.
- Will my child share the name Mykel with classmates?
- Mykel will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More M names
The most-given names starting with M, all years combined.
Mary#125 · Margaret#112 · Michelle#465 · Melissa#419 · Maria#87 · Martha#712 · Marie#617 · Mildred#1962
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Mykel? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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