Marvin
given name · Latin script
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Marvin is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country. Recorded meaning: from Merefinnes/Merefin, an early name probably from an Old English personal name; first attested Ælfwine Merefinnes sune c1060 KCD (Nth).
- PHPhilippines≈1 in 615(inferred from the name graph)
- SGSingapore≈1 in 1.7K
- DEGermany≈1 in 1.8K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- China (inferred from the name graph)
- #710 (measured from records)
- 4 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 535 (measured from records)
- 1 in 408 (inferred from the name graph)
≈710,000 people, est.
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Costa Rica
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
One other spelling is counted as the same name:
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
from Merefinnes/Merefin, an early name probably from an Old English personal name; first attested Ælfwine Merefinnes sune c1060 KCD (Nth)
Sources 1
- A Dictionary of English Surnames
Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Marvin counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.
Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CN China | — | ≈710,000 est. | ≈1 in 2K | — | Marvin | 36 |
| PH Philippines | #108 | ≈180,000 est. | ≈1 in 615 | — | Marvin | 166 |
| US United States | #301 | 135,343 | 1 in 2.5K | 135K | Marvin | 535 |
| DE Germany | #318 | ≈44,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.8K | — | Marvin | 232 |
| GB United Kingdom | #441 | ≈24,000 est. | ≈1 in 2.8K | 148 | Marvin | 226 |
| CR Costa Rica | — | 12,480 | 1 in 408 | 12K | — | 4 |
| SG Singapore | #196 | ≈3,600 est. | ≈1 in 1.7K | — | Marvin | 71 |
| GY Guyana | — | 640 | 1 in 1.2K | 640 | — | 9 |
Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.
Registers cited: Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Surnames of England and Wales (taliesin-arlein.net, Sept 2002 electoral register); TSE — electoral roll (padrón) names; Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025. Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.
Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).
Other recorded senses(measured from records)
Marvin is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In French, English name of uncertain origin, often linked to Welsh Mervyn or Old English roots.
as a nameLe grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)
In English, a different form of Mervyn
as a nameEncyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
In Swedish, Marvin är en variant av det medeltida engelska förnamnet Mervyn som senare användes som släktnamn och togs i bruk som förnamn igen på 1800-talet. Det är särskilt vanligt i USA. En fiktiv gestalt med namnet Marvin finns i Douglas Adams roman Liftarens guide till galaxen (1979, senare även som filmer och dataspel).
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
In English, lang., India, Pakistan
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, Marwari [Rajasthani]
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Marvin Millerb. 1913USAmerican actor
- Marvin Minskyb. 1927USAmerican cognitive scientist (1927-2016)
- Walter Koenigb. 1936USnot in their usual nameAmerican actor and screenwriter
- Marvin Gayeb. 1939USAmerican R&B and soul singer (1939–1984)
- Marvin Hamlischb. 1944USAmerican composer and conductor (1944-2012)
- Marv Wolfmanb. 1946USnot in their usual nameAmerican comic book writer
- Ted DiBiaseb. 1954USnot in their usual nameAmerican professional wrestler
- Ted DiBiase Jr.b. 1982USnot in their usual nameAmerican professional wrestler and actor
- Marvin Plattenhardtb. 1992DEGerman association football player
- Marvin Duckschb. 1994DEprofessional football player
The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 114 sources across 58 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 135K | #420 |
| CR Costa Rica | TSE — electoral roll (padrón) names | — | 12K | #34 |
| GY Guyana | Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025 | 2025 | 640 | #131 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 470 | #420 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 385 | — |
Reference works 6
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Marvin mean, and where does it come from?
- from Merefinnes/Merefin, an early name probably from an Old English personal name; first attested Ælfwine Merefinnes sune c1060 KCD (Nth) Recorded by A Dictionary of English Surnames.
- In which country does Marvin have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 707 thousand people named Marvin in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled marvin.
- Where is Marvin most common?
- Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Marvin is densest in Costa Rica — about 1 in 408 people — even though China holds more of our records for it.
- Is Marvin a male or female name?
- Marvin is a male name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- What are other forms of the name Marvin?
- In the etymology graph, Mervyn, Marwin and Marvyn are forms of the same name in other languages.
- How common is the name Marvin?
- In the United States, the national register counted 135,343 people named Marvin in 2020, about 1 in 2.5 thousand residents.
- How common is Marvin compared with other names?
- In the Philippines, Marvin is the 108th most common given name of 486,299 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Marvin?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/marvinThe same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), and bulk access is licensed separately.
About this data
measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated
These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.
Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.
Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.
Cite this page Mondonomo, “Marvin” — the 108th most common given name in Philippines. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.