Merl — boys' name

What the Data Says About Merl

The Social Security Administration has registered 2,574 babies named Merl between 1886 and 1986, spanning 101 consecutive years of U.S. birth records. As a boy's name, Merl currently falls outside the top 1,000 boys' names for 1986. The name reached its historical peak in 1922, when 83 babies received it in a single year. Merl is classified as unisex in SSA records: the opposite-sex variant accounts for 278 additional births since 1895.

Decade-level aggregation shows that Merl performed strongest in the 1920s, accumulating 693 births during that ten-year window. Across the 11 decades of recorded activity, Merl shows a clear decline from its mid-century high. Geographically, the name is most concentrated in Indiana, which accounts for 100 births — the largest state-level total in the dataset — followed by Pennsylvania and Ohio. In total, SSA state-level files list Merl in 18 of the 51 U.S. reporting jurisdictions.

No etymological entry is currently available for Merl in our reference dataset. These figures derive from SSA's annual national and state-level name files, which include any name appearing at least five times in a given year or state-year; names below that threshold are suppressed for privacy and therefore excluded from the totals shown here. The 2,574 total represents a lower bound — actual usage may be higher in years or states where the count fell below the disclosure floor. This page is provided for informational and research purposes only and does not constitute personal, legal, or naming advice.