Meriel
given name · Latin script
Meaning: Northern English form of the Scottish name Muriel
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/ˈmɪɹiɫ/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Meriel is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Indonesia than in any other country.
- PHPhilippines≈1 in 105K(inferred from the name graph)
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 142K
- USUnited States1 in 756K
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.
- Indonesia (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 150 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 105K (inferred from the name graph)
≈1,100 people, est.
Highest-authority source
Philippines, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
Northern English form of the Scottish name Muriel. It is recorded frequently in Yorkshire from the 15th century onwards.
Sources 1
- A concise dictionary of first names
Attested across 2 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Meriel 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| ID Indonesia | ≈1,100 est. | ≈1 in 240K | — | Meriel | 21 |
| PH Philippines | ≈1,000 est. | ≈1 in 105K | — | Meriel | 31 |
| GB United Kingdom | ≈460 est. | ≈1 in 142K | listed | Meriel | 99 |
| US United States | 440 | 1 in 756K | 432 | Meriel | 150 |
| AU Australia | ≈91 est. | ≈1 in 280K | 1 | Meriel | 40 |
| FI Finland | 34 | 1 in 164K | 45 | — | 2 |
| EE Estonia | ≈7 est. | ≈1 in 176K | 11 | — | 2 |
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; SA BDM — Popular baby names South Australia (1944–present); DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); Statistics Estonia — per-name Population Register counts (nimed). 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)
Meriel 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.
English: variant of MURIEL ; both forms are 19th-century revivals of an older Celtic name. Of the two forms, Meriel was never as popular as Muriel , but for that reason seems to have escaped the current somewhat old-fashioned image of the latter name.
as a word
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)
- Meriel Williamsb. 1627GBof Ystumcolwyn
- Meriel Talbotb. 1866GBBritish public servant and women's welfare worker (1866-1956)
- Meriel Forbesb. 1913GBBritish actress (1913-2000)
- Meriel Douglas-Homeb. 1939GBnoblewoman; (born 1939)
- Meriel Dickinsonb. 1940GBEnglish mezzo‐soprano vocalist,
- Meriel Patricia Tufnellb. 1948British jockey
- Jane Dawnayb. 1953GBnot in their usual namenoblewoman (born 1953); daughter of Robert Grosvenor, 5th Duke of Westminster, and Hon. Viola Lyttelton
- Jo Stevensb. 1966GBnot in their usual nameWelsh politician and MP for Cardiff Central (born 1966)
- Stevie Schmiedelb. 1971not in their usual nameGerman-British gender researcher
- Meriel Iona Macdonaldb. 1978GB(born 1978)
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 36 sources across 21 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | wru Name Dictionary — US surnames, voter-file supplement (Khanna et al.) | — | — | — |
Reference works 1
- 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
- Where does the name Meriel come from?
- Northern English form of the Scottish name Muriel. It is recorded frequently in Yorkshire from the 15th century onwards. Recorded by A concise dictionary of first names.
- What are other forms of the name Meriel?
- In the etymology graph, Muriel, Merle and Murielle are forms of the same name in other languages.
- How do you pronounce Meriel?
- A machine transcription gives /ˈmɪɹiɫ/ (IPA) for English.
- Is Meriel a male or female name?
- Meriel 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 does the name Meriel mean?
- Recorded meaning: Northern English form of the Scottish name Muriel.
- In which country does Meriel have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 1.1 thousand people named Meriel in Indonesia, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled meriel.
- How common is the name Meriel?
- In the United States, the national register counted 440 people named Meriel in 2020, about 1 in 756 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Meriel?
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/merielThe 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, “Meriel”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.