Steffen
given name · Latin script
Meaning, in German: From Greek Stephanos ‘wreath, crown’; plate shows labial fricative variation in the spelling. 16600 bearers
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/ʃtɛfn̩/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Steffen is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country, where it is the 7th most common given name.
- RORomania1 in 69as Ştefan(measured from records)
- BGBulgaria1 in 137as Стефан
- SESweden1 in 140as Stefan
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). Where a country counts another spelling of the name rather than Steffen itself, the figure is that spelling’s, and it is named. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- United States (measured from records)
- #17 (measured from records)
- 10 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 690 (measured from records)
- 1 in 69 (inferred from the name graph)
972,808 named Steven, 2020
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Romania, as Ştefan
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
10 other spellings are counted as the same name:
Locally spelled Stefan in DE Germany, RO Romania, BG Bulgaria and 2 more, Stephen in GB United Kingdom, NG Nigeria and Steven in US United States.
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 Greek Stephanos ‘wreath, crown’; plate shows labial fricative variation in the spelling. 16600 bearers.
Sources 1
- Deutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus
Attested across 12 languages in the etymology graph.
How Steffen is read(measured from records)
Steffen is one spelling over 2 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- German85%
From Greek Stephanos ‘wreath, crown’; plate shows labial fricative variation in the spelling. 16600 bearers.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus
Patronymischer Familienname zu Rufname Stephan; 14256 Träger. Die Karte zeigt a>e-Abschwächung in der Endsilbe (-an/-en) und Varianten mit -en/-ens.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 1: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen I, Vokalismus
Patronym zu Stephan; zeigt f(f)-Schreibung gegenüber ph, mit eingedeutschteren Formen häufiger. Bearer count: 6938.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus
Vokalvarianz zwischen Stephan/Steffen; Karte 288 zeigt die Verteilung der e/i-Formen. 14256 Bearer.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 1: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen I, Vokalismus
- Danish5.2%
a male given name, variant of Stefan
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Steffen 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 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | #7 | 972,808as Steven | 1 in 342 | 972K | Steven | 690 |
| DE Germany | #3 | ≈540,000 est. | ≈1 in 148 | listed | Stefan | 354 |
| NG Nigeria | #63 | ≈380,000 est. | ≈1 in 556 | — | Stephen | 155 |
| GB United Kingdom | #5 | ≈380,000 est. | ≈1 in 175 | 28K | Stephen | 438 |
| RO Romania | #144 | 309,900as Ştefan | 1 in 69 | 310K | Stefan | 103 |
| SE Sweden | #23 | 72,629as Stefan | 1 in 140 | 73K | Stefan | 188 |
| AT Austria | #3 | ≈60,000 est. | ≈1 in 147 | 31K | Stefan | 210 |
| BG Bulgaria | #8 | 50,950as Стефан | 1 in 137 | 51K | Stefan | 160 |
972,808 people counted by Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex, 2020. 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); DEPABD — name-day population snapshot; NSI — most common given names (population); Statistik Austria — STATatlas Vornamen WFS (per-name time series 1984–2024); Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population). 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)
Steffen is also recorded in one other lexicon, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In Swedish, Se Stefan.
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
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)
- Steffen Zachariasb. 1927DEGerman actor (1927–1989)
- Steffen Seibertb. 1960DEGerman journalist and diplomat
- Steffen Winkb. 1967DEGerman actor
- Steffen Freundb. 1970DEGerman footballer
- Steffen Baumgartb. 1972DEGerman football manager
- Steffen Grothb. 1974DEGerman actor
- Steffen Iversenb. 1976NONorwegian association football player and manager
- Steffen Hofmannb. 1980DEGerman footballer
- Steffen Hamannb. 1981DEGerman basketball player (born 1981)
- Steffen Weinholdb. 1986DEGerman handball 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).
How to address them(machine-generated)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 69 sources across 36 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 1.7K | #8,558 |
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 301 | #3,925 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2020 | 183 | — |
| AT Austria | Statistik Austria — STATatlas Vornamen WFS (per-name time series 1984–2024) | 2019 | 48 | #1,720 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 22 | #8,558 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 5 | — |
| AT Austria | Statistik Austria — Vornamen der Geborenen (1984–present) | 2019 | 1 | #3,288 |
Reference works 6
- 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)
- Rymut, Słownik nazwisk współcześnie w Polsce używanych (10 vols, IJP PAN, Kraków 1992–1994) — every Polish surname in the PESEL register at the end of 1990, with bearer counts nationally and per voivodeship1990
- jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)
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 Steffen mean, and where does it come from?
- From Greek Stephanos ‘wreath, crown’; plate shows labial fricative variation in the spelling. 16600 bearers. Recorded by Deutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 2: Graphematik/Phonologie der Familiennamen II, Konsonantismus.
- Is Steffen a male or female name?
- Steffen is recorded for both men and women. We don't publish a percentage split: a record's gender belongs to the person and is attached to every given name on that record, so names in cultures where a name string also carries a parent's or spouse's given name pick up large cross-gender counts.
- What are other forms of the name Steffen?
- In the etymology graph, Steven, Stephen and Esteban are forms of the same name in other languages.
- In which country does Steffen have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 973 thousand people named Steven, more than in any other country we hold.
- Where is Steffen most common?
- No national register we hold counts the spelling Steffen itself. The densest figure for its family of spellings is Romania's: the national register counts about 1 in 69 people named Ştefan.
- How do you pronounce Steffen?
- A machine transcription gives /ʃtɛfn̩/ (IPA) for German.
- How common is the name Steffen?
- In the United States, the national register counted 972,808 people named Steven in 2020, about 1 in 342 residents.
- How common is Steffen compared with other names?
- In the United States, Steffen is the 7th most common given name of 2,815,431 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Steffen?
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/steffenThe 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), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
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, “Steffen” — the 7th most common given name in United States. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.