Merci
Merci is given to both girls and boys: 44 girls and 11 boys were given it in 2025 (#3,501 among girls’ names and #7,505 among boys’, #5,314 among all names counting both); 1,055 Americans have been recorded with it since 1963 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
An estimated 1,040 Americans named Merci and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 10 years old and half are between 5 and 21.
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Merci by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
What does Merci mean?
Wiktionary, Hungarian section
Merci is “a diminutive of the female given name Mercédesz”
Clipping and -i diminutive of Mercedes-Benz or Mercédesz.
[ˈmɛrt͡si]
Meaning: Wiktionary, Hungarian section, as of Sep 25, 2026 (CC BY‑SA 4.0).
How popular is Merci?
#3,501 among girls’ names, 2025
Merci rose from #4,464 in 2015 to #3,501 in 2025 among girls’ names; its share of girls born rose from 17.9 to 27.4 per million.
74 babies in 2019, the peak
Merci peaked in 2019, when 74 babies were given it (69 girls, #2,556 among girls’ names). The 55 births of 2025 (girls and boys) are 74% of that peak.
Births by sex.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2025 | 44 | #3,501 | 27.4 |
| 2024 | 32 | #4,444 | 19.8 |
| 2023 | 49 | #3,314 | 30.5 |
| 2022 | 66 | #2,655 | 40.2 |
| 2021 | 48 | #3,327 | 29.3 |
| 2020 | 47 | #3,320 | 29.1 |
| 2019 | 69 | #2,556 | 41.1 |
| 2018 | 51 | #3,189 | 30.0 |
| 2017 | 47 | #3,373 | 27.2 |
| 2016 | 45 | #3,503 | 25.4 |
Every recorded year (53)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | 32 | #4,464 | 17.9 |
| 2014 | 34 | #4,330 | 19.0 |
| 2013 | 26 | #5,257 | 14.8 |
| 2012 | 19 | #6,783 | 10.8 |
| 2011 | 23 | #5,874 | 13.1 |
| 2010 | 19 | #6,812 | 10.7 |
| 2009 | 23 | #6,026 | 12.5 |
| 2008 | 18 | #7,290 | 9.5 |
| 2007 | 12 | #9,968 | 6.2 |
| 2006 | 15 | #8,111 | 7.9 |
| 2005 | 22 | #5,717 | 11.9 |
| 2004 | 8 | #12,364 | 4.4 |
| 2003 | 15 | #7,456 | 8.2 |
| 2002 | 24 | #5,026 | 13.4 |
| 2001 | 16 | #6,859 | 8.9 |
| 2000 | 8 | #11,432 | 4.4 |
| 1999 | 9 | #10,042 | 5.1 |
| 1998 | 7 | #11,959 | 4.0 |
| 1997 | 5 | #15,281 | 2.9 |
| 1996 | 6 | #12,886 | 3.4 |
| 1995 | 6 | #12,785 | 3.4 |
| 1993 | 6 | #12,863 | 3.3 |
| 1991 | 5 | #14,573 | 2.7 |
| 1989 | 8 | #9,324 | 4.3 |
| 1987 | 5 | #12,527 | 2.9 |
| 1986 | 7 | #9,188 | 4.1 |
| 1983 | 5 | #11,346 | 3.0 |
| 1982 | 11 | #6,200 | 6.5 |
| 1981 | 5 | #11,490 | 3.0 |
| 1980 | 5 | #11,485 | 3.0 |
| 1979 | 5 | #11,285 | 3.1 |
| 1978 | 5 | #10,802 | 3.3 |
| 1977 | 5 | #10,646 | 3.3 |
| 1976 | 5 | #10,279 | 3.4 |
| 1975 | 7 | #7,670 | 4.8 |
| 1974 | 6 | #8,333 | 4.1 |
| 1973 | 12 | #4,744 | 8.2 |
| 1972 | 7 | #7,012 | 4.6 |
| 1971 | 6 | #7,979 | 3.6 |
| 1970 | 6 | #7,649 | 3.4 |
| 1969 | 8 | #5,794 | 4.7 |
| 1967 | 10 | #4,512 | 6.1 |
| 1963 | 7 | #5,701 | 3.6 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Merci a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Of the 1,055 Americans recorded as Merci, 94% are girls and 6% boys.
Years with fewer than 20 babies given the name are left blank.
Girls and boys named Merci: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Merci, and how old are they?
1,040 alive in 2026, estimated
That is 99% of the 1,055 Americans ever recorded as Merci. The median Merci alive today is 10 years old; half are between 5 and 21.
The 2020 Census counted 974 people named Merci (881 women and girls, 93 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 720 born in the U.S. The Census count is 35% above that prediction. Possible reasons: the Census counts people born abroad, whom SSA’s files leave out, and it records the name people give, which SSA may have recorded under another spelling or as part of a compound name.
Alive today, by age
Alive today, by generation
| Generation | Born | Alive |
|---|---|---|
| Baby Boomers | 1946-1964 | 6 |
| Generation X | 1965-1980 | 81 |
| Millennials | 1981-1996 | 62 |
| Generation Z | 1997-2012 | 241 |
| Generation Alpha | 2013-2025 | 650 |
An estimate, not a count. SSA’s files count people born in the United States who received a Social Security number, so anyone born abroad is not in them; before 1937 most people got a number as adults, and their survival is counted from that age.
Living estimate: SSA births carried forward with the survival rates in SSA’s cohort life tables (2024 Trustees Report) for each birth year and sex. How the estimate is made. Count: Census Bureau, first names in the 2020 Census (released April 14, 2026; names reported 100 or more times, with the Bureau’s disclosure-avoidance adjustment).
Names spelled alike
Of these 5 names spelled alike, given to 12,753 babies since 1880, Merci is the second most given (8.3% of them). In 2025 it was given to 55 of their 404 babies (14%), again the second most given.
Spelled alike: names in the SSA national file with the same pattern of letters and sounds and at most two letters apart, and Wiktionary’s listed forms; births since 1880 and in 2025, and each name’s peak year, from the SSA national file, published May 8, 2026. Some are separate names, not spellings of one.
Names that rose and fell in the same decades as Merci
Names whose births rose and fell across the same decades, measured on each decade’s share of births.
Similar histories: each decade’s share of births, from the SSA national file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
More about Merci and names like it
- Compare Merci and MercyBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sMerci peaked in 2019.
- Texas’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Merci since 1910.
- Hungarian namesWiktionary’s origin for Merci: every such name, by how often it is given.
- The top names of 2019The year the most babies were named Merci.
- The names of Generation AlphaMost people named Merci alive today were born 2013-2025.
- Names starting with MMost given first.