Terry
given name · Latin script
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Terry is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country. In Singapore it is the 49th most common given name. Recorded meaning: (i) from the medieval personal name Therry/Terry, ultimately from Germanic Theodoric; (ii) potter; (iii) from Irish Gaelic Mac Toirdhealbhaigh.
- IEIreland≈1 in 504(inferred from the name graph)
- NZNew Zealand≈1 in 539
- CACanada≈1 in 550
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.
- United States (measured from records)
- #254 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 623 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 398 (inferred from the name graph)
376,955 people, 2020
of 15M given names
Highest-authority source
Åland Islands, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
- GermanicTheodoric(measured from records)
- Irish Gaelic MacToirdhealbhaigh(measured from records)
(i) from the medieval personal name Therry/Terry, ultimately from Germanic Theodoric; (ii) potter; (iii) from Irish Gaelic Mac Toirdhealbhaigh.
Sources 1
- Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Terry 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 | #104 | 376,955 | 1 in 882 | 300K | Terry | 623 |
| GB United Kingdom | #152 | ≈94,000 est. | ≈1 in 696 | 5 | Terry | 323 |
| CA Canada | #87 | ≈69,000 est. | ≈1 in 550 | 2 | Terry | 321 |
| IT Italy | #233 | ≈61,000 est. | ≈1 in 1K | listed | Terry | 93 |
| AU Australia | #165 | ≈34,000 est. | ≈1 in 756 | 90 | Terry | 261 |
| SG Singapore | #49 | ≈11,000 est. | ≈1 in 566 | — | Terry | 111 |
| IE Ireland | #77 | ≈10,000 est. | ≈1 in 504 | — | Terry | 107 |
| NZ New Zealand | #105 | ≈9,100 est. | ≈1 in 539 | 23 | Terry | 123 |
| AX Åland Islands | #82 | ≈66 est. | ≈1 in 398 | — | Terry | 4 |
376,955 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; NRS — Baby names Scotland full list (1974–present); Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender; NSW BDM — Popular baby names (1952–present); DIA — Baby name popularity (1900–present). 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)
Terry is also recorded in 3 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In English, A type of coarse cotton fabric covered in many small raised loops that is used to make towels, bathrobes and some types of nappy/diaper.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In English, Manly; strong.
as a nameBaby names, 25,350 baby names nicknames for your family, friends pets, including the top 100 names, 2,000 most popular…
In Irish, (French Terri from Old-German Theudoric, people rule). This Anglo-Norman family was closely associated with the city and county of Cork from the thirteenth century. Terry is also used for Mac Toirdealbhaigh —see Turley. Bibl. MIF
as a nameThe Surnames of Ireland
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)
- Terry Mooreb. 1929USAmerican actress
- Terry Jonesb. 1942GBWelsh actor, comedian, director, historian and writer (1942–2020)
- Terry Venablesb. 1943GBEnglish football player and manager (1943–2023)
- Terry Eagletonb. 1943GBBritish writer, academic and educator
- Teri Garrb. 1944USnot in their usual nameAmerican actress (1944–2024)
- Terry Georgeb. 1952GBIrish screenwriter
- Terry O'Quinnb. 1952USAmerican actor
- Hulk Hoganb. 1953USnot in their usual nameAmerican professional wrestler, actor and television personality (1953–2025)
- Terry McAuliffeb. 1957USAmerican businessman and politician
- Terry Foxb. 1958CACanadian athlete, humanitarian, and cancer research activist
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 99 sources across 52 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 300K | #125 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 77K | #125 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 192 | — |
| AU Australia | NSW BDM — Popular baby names (1952–present) | 1972 | 90 | #90 |
| AU Australia | QLD BDM — Top 100 Baby Names Queensland (1960–present) | 1977 | 44 | — |
| CA Canada | Statistics Canada — First names at birth by sex at birth (Table 17-10-0147-01) | 2024 | 14 | — |
| NZ New Zealand | DIA — Baby name popularity (1900–present) | 2001 | 14 | — |
| NZ New Zealand | DIA — Baby name popularity (1900–present) | 1961 | 14 | — |
| CA Canada | Statistics Canada — First names at birth by sex at birth (Table 17-10-0147-01) | 1999 | 5 | — |
| CA Canada | Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender | 2024 | 2 | #1,520 |
Reference works 7
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Nişanyan Adlar (Turkish given-name national-registry frequency)
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- 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
- Is Terry a male or female name?
- Terry 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 does the name Terry mean, and where does it come from?
- (i) from the medieval personal name Therry/Terry, ultimately from Germanic Theodoric; (ii) potter; (iii) from Irish Gaelic Mac Toirdhealbhaigh. Recorded by Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history].
- What are other forms of the name Terry?
- In the etymology graph, Teresa, Tracy and Derek are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Theresa and Terence.
- In which country does Terry have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 377 thousand people named Terry, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled terry.
- How common is the name Terry?
- In the United States, the national register counted 376,955 people named Terry in 2020, about 1 in 882 residents.
- How common is Terry compared with other names?
- In the United States, Terry is the 104th most common given name of 2,815,431 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Terry?
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/terryThe 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, “Terry” — the 104th most common given name in United States. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.