Madeleine

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.

Attested across 28 languages in the etymology graph.

Madeleine is one spelling over 3 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.

• French40%

  French form of Magdalene, from Hebrew Magdala, a place name.

  as a name·Le grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education)

  madeleine (small gateau in the shape of a scallop shell)

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

  Du nom biblique de Marie-Madeleine, « de Magdala »; associée à la pécheresse repentante. Fête: 22 juillet.

  as a name·Dictionnaire généalogique des prénoms

  Du latin Magdalena, « de Magdala »; nom de Marie Madeleine, fêtée le 22 juillet.

  as a name·Dictionnaire généalogique des prénoms

• English33%

  French; from Magdalene, woman from Magdala

  as a name·Baby names, 25,350 baby names nicknames for your family, friends pets, including the top 100 names, 2,000 most popular…

  A French type of small gateau or sponge cake, often shaped like an elongated scallop shell.

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• Spanish9.5%

  No dictionary in our sources glosses Madeleine in Spanish.

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 We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.

Names that people choosing a name often weigh against Madeleine, most often first. They share a style rather than an origin.

• Genevieve
• Juliette
• Josephine
• Isabelle
• Vivienne

From the names suggested together in public name-advice forums, in English. A list of what people consider, not a measure of how common any name is.

Madeleine is also recorded as 4 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

• English given name18 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in United States, Australia, United Kingdom, Sweden

  Languages: English, German, Swedish

  Also written Madeléine, Màdeleine, Madeleíne, Madeleïne, Madeleiné

• Spanish given name4 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Peru, United States, Argentina, Venezuela

  Languages: Spanish, Portuguese

  Also written Madeléine, Madeleiné

• Russian given name17 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in United States, United Kingdom, Czechia, Poland

  Languages: Russian, Polish, Czech

  Also written Madelyn, Madlyn, Мэдлин, Маделеине, Маделейне

• a separate given name3 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in United States, Norway, United Kingdom, Sweden

  Also written Madeleiné, Madeleíne

73 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

• Madeleine Albrightb. 1937USUnited States Secretary of State from 1997 to 2001
• Isabelle Huppertb. 1953FRnot in their usual nameFrench actress (born 1953)
• Christine Lagardeb. 1956FRnot in their usual namePresident of the European Central Bank

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).

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.

97 registers and reference works attest this spelling, across 52 countries.

Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.

How do you pronounce Madeleine?

It depends on the language: in French /mad.lɛn/ (Wiktionary); in English /ˈmad(ə)lɛn/ (Wiktionary); in Spanish /maðeleine/. Transcriptions are machine-generated except where a dictionary is named.

What are other forms of the name Madeleine?

In the etymology graph, Magdalena, Lena and Magali are forms of the same name in other languages.

What does the name Madeleine mean, and where does it come from?

French form of Magdalene, from Hebrew Magdala, a place name. Recorded by Le grand guide des prénoms (Enfant - Education).

Is Madeleine a male or female name?

Madeleine is a female name. National registers that list it by sex list it as female: France (INSEE, 2024), United States (Census Bureau, 2020), Norway (SSB) and Netherlands (Meertens NVB), among others.

Which countries have the most people named Madeleine?

Mondonomo estimates about 55 thousand people named Madeleine in France, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled madeleine. After it come Congo - Kinshasa, Cameroon, United States and Sweden; the country table on this page ranks them.

Where is Madeleine most common?

Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Madeleine is densest in Sweden — about 1 in 433 people — even though France holds more of our records for it.

How common is the name Madeleine?

In the United States, the national register counted 36,774 people named Madeleine in 2020, about 1 in 9.0 thousand residents.

How common is Madeleine compared with other names?

In France, Madeleine is the 247th most common given name of 754,146 given names recorded there.