Vivian
given name · Latin script
Meaning: from the medieval personal name Vivian, from Latin Vivianus, based on vivus ‘alive’
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/vɪviən/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Vivian is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country.
- HKHong Kong≈1 in 872(inferred from the name graph)
- NGNigeria≈1 in 1.2K
- PHPhilippines≈1 in 1.6K
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 Vivian 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.
- China (inferred from the name graph)
- #926 (measured from records)
- 6 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 528 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 872 (inferred from the name graph)
≈830,000 people, est.
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Hong Kong, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Locally spelled Vivien in HU Hungary.
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 the medieval personal name Vivian, from Latin Vivianus, based on vivus ‘alive’
Sources 1
- Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
Attested across 7 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Vivian 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 | — | ≈830,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.7K | — | Vivian | 74 |
| NG Nigeria | #312 | ≈180,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.2K | — | Vivian | 114 |
| US United States | #395 | 129,224 | 1 in 2.6K | 128K | Vivian | 528 |
| PH Philippines | #494 | ≈70,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.6K | — | Vivian | 116 |
| BR Brazil | — | 54,722 | 1 in 3.9K | 55K | — | 10 |
| HU Hungary | #122 | 30,268as Vivien | 1 in 323 | 30K | Vivien | 144 |
| HK Hong Kong | #107 | ≈8,300 est. | ≈1 in 872 | — | Vivian | 80 |
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; IBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror); Nyilvántartó — Top-100 given names in population (2020–2025). 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)
Vivian 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 English, from the personal name Vivianus (Latin vivianus ‘lively’); first attested Johannes filius Viuian 1175 P (K)
as a nameA Dictionary of English Surnames
In English, from Latin Vivianus, from vivus ‘living’; first attested Roger Fidian 1279 RH (C)
as a nameA Dictionary of English Surnames
In English, Gracious in life or lively; full of life, vital
as a nameBaby names, 25,350 baby names nicknames for your family, friends pets, including the top 100 names, 2,000 most popular…
, occasionally 2 From an Old French form of the Latin name Vividnus (probably a derivative of vivus ‘alive’). The name was borne by a 5th-century bishop of Saintes in western France, remembered for protecting his people during the invasion of the Visigoths. Variants: Vivien, Vyvyan. Short forms: Viv; Vi, Vivi (9).
as a nameA concise dictionary of first names
In Italian, redução dialetal setentrional de Viviano.
as a nameDicionário dos sobrenomes italianos
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)
- Vivian Woodwardb. 1879GBEnglish footballer (1879-1954)
- Vivian Maierb. 1926USFrench-American photographer (1926–2009)
- Michael Penningtonb. 1943GBnot in their usual nameEnglish actor (1943–2026)
- Vivian Kubrickb. 1960USAmerican film composer and director (born 1960)
- Vivian Campbellb. 1962GBNorthern Irish guitarist
- Vivian Wub. 1966CNChinese actress
- Cliff Curtisb. 1968NZnot in their usual nameNew Zealand actor
- Amy Coney Barrettb. 1972USnot in their usual nameAmerican lawyer and jurist (born 1972)
- Vivian Cheruiyotb. 1983KEKenyan long-distance runner
- Vivian Jenna Wilsonb. 2004USAmerican model
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 116 sources across 58 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 128K | #436 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror) | 2022 | 55K | — |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 54K | #531 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Nomes (census name API) | — | 51K | #777 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 3.4K | — |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | 2020 | 1.5K | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 1K | #436 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 278 | #531 |
Reference works 8
- 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)
- Ethiopian name tokens (GitHub lehagere/ethiopian-names, 40/60 condominium list)
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 Vivian a male or female name?
- Vivian is a female 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 Vivian?
- In the etymology graph, Vivien, Vivi and Bevin are forms of the same name in other languages.
- What does the name Vivian mean, and where does it come from?
- from the medieval personal name Vivian, from Latin Vivianus, based on vivus ‘alive’ Recorded by Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history].
- How do you pronounce Vivian?
- A machine transcription gives /vɪviən/ (IPA) for English.
- In which country does Vivian have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 833 thousand people named Vivian in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled vivian.
- How common is the name Vivian?
- In the United States, the national register counted 129,224 people named Vivian in 2020, about 1 in 2.6 thousand residents.
- How common is Vivian compared with other names?
- In Hong Kong, Vivian is the 107th most common given name of 23,276 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Vivian?
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/vivianThe 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, “Vivian” — the 107th most common given name in Hong Kong. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.