Pearl
loc · Latin script
Meaning: ‘trader in pearls’; also an anglicization of ..
Recorded as a female name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Pearl is a name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country.
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 37K(inferred from the name graph)
- CACanada≈1 in 39K
- USUnited States1 in 44K
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 Pearl 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)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 432 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 17K (inferred from the name graph)
≈58,000 people, est.
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
South Africa, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
One other spelling is counted as the same name:
Locally spelled Perl in DE Germany, GB United Kingdom, AT Austria and 1 more.
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)
‘trader in pearls’; also an anglicization of ...
Sources 1
- Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
Attested across 9 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Pearl 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 | ≈58,000 est. | ≈1 in 24K | — | Pearl | 24 |
| US United States | 7,570 | 1 in 44K | 30K | Pearl | 432 |
| ZA South Africa | ≈3,300 est. | ≈1 in 17K | — | Perl | 74 |
| GB United Kingdom | ≈1,800 est. | ≈1 in 37K | 116 | Perl | 180 |
| DE Germany | ≈1,800 est. | ≈1 in 45K | — | Perl | 95 |
| CA Canada | ≈960 est. | ≈1 in 39K | 5 | Pearl | 142 |
| AT Austria | ≈480 est. | ≈1 in 18K | 14 | Perl | 52 |
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 — Surname Frequency 2010; Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender; Surnames of England and Wales (taliesin-arlein.net, Sept 2002 electoral register); Statistik Austria — STATatlas Vornamen WFS (per-name time series 1984–2024). 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)
Pearl 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 ME/OFr perle 'pearl', metonymic for a seller of pearls; first attested Henry, Reginald Perle 1259 Oseney (O)
as a nameA Dictionary of English Surnames
One of the group of names coined in the r9th century from words for precious and semi-precious stones. It has a longer history as a Jewish name, representing an Anglicized form of Yiddish Perle (see also Peninnah).
as a nameA concise dictionary of first names
In English, Old French; also a precious gem.
as a nameBaby names, 25,350 baby names nicknames for your family, friends pets, including the top 100 names, 2,000 most popular…
Perla
as a nameIl grande libro dei nomi per bebè. Significato, origini, curiosità. Oltre 7000 nomi per bambine e bambini Significato,…
English: one of the group of names coined in the 19th century from words for precious and semi-precious stones. It has a longer history as a Jewish name, representing an Anglicized form of Yiddish Perle , an affectionate nickname or vernacular equivalent of MARGARET . Cognates: Italian, Spanish: Perla. Pet form: Spanish: Perlita .
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)
- Zane Greyb. 1872USnot in their usual nameAmerican novelist (1872–1939)
- Pearl Buckb. 1892USAmerican writer (1892–1973)
- Pearl Whiteb. 1892USAmerican actress (1889–1938)
- Pearl Baileyb. 1918USAmerican actress and singer (1918–1990)
- Judea Pearlb. 1936USIsraeli-American computer scientist (born 1936)
- Barry Pearlb. 1950USAmerican actor
- Daniel Pearlb. 1963USAmerican journalist (1963–2002)
- Aaron Pearlb. 1972CACanadian actor
- Pearl Mackieb. 1987GBBritish actress
- Mabelb. 1996SEnot in their usual nameSwedish-British singer
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 70 sources across 39 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 30K | #1,242 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 460 | #1,242 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 350 | — |
| CA Canada | Statistics Canada — First names at birth by sex at birth (Table 17-10-0147-01) | 2024 | 41 | — |
| AT Austria | Statistik Austria — STATatlas Vornamen WFS (per-name time series 1984–2024) | 2023 | 14 | #1,838 |
| GB United Kingdom | NRS — Baby names Scotland full list (1974–present) | 2024 | 9 | #351 |
| GB United Kingdom | NISRA — Baby names Northern Ireland full list (1997–present) | 2024 | 6 | #253 |
| CA Canada | Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender | 2024 | 5 | #789 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 1983 | 5 | — |
| AT Austria | Statistik Austria — Vornamen der Geborenen (1984–present) | 2023 | 1 | #3,246 |
| GB United Kingdom | NISRA — Baby names Northern Ireland full list (1997–present) | 2025 | — | — |
Reference works 5
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- 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)
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 Pearl mean, and where does it come from?
- ‘trader in pearls’; also an anglicization of ... Recorded by Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history].
- In which country does Pearl have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 58 thousand people named Pearl in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled pearl.
- How common is the name Pearl?
- In the United States, the national register counted 7,570 people named Pearl in 2010, about 1 in 44 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Pearl?
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/pearlThe 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, “Pearl”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.