Merly
Merly was last recorded in 2024, when 8 babies were given it; 242 Americans have been recorded with it between 1986 and 2024 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Merly by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Merly?
Unranked in 2025
Its last girls’ rank on record is #11,794, in 2024; SSA lists a name only in years with 5 or more births.
14 babies in 2012, the peak
Merly peaked in 2012, when 14 girls were given it, #8,491 among girls’ names. It was not recorded in 2025.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2024 | 8 | #11,794 | 4.9 |
| 2022 | 5 | #16,929 | 3.0 |
| 2021 | 9 | #10,839 | 5.5 |
| 2020 | 5 | #16,714 | 3.1 |
| 2019 | 6 | #14,974 | 3.6 |
| 2018 | 10 | #10,314 | 5.9 |
| 2017 | 5 | #17,577 | 2.9 |
| 2016 | 7 | #13,874 | 4.0 |
| 2014 | 10 | #10,674 | 5.6 |
| 2013 | 11 | #10,019 | 6.3 |
Every recorded year (32)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2012 | 14 | #8,491 | 7.9 |
| 2011 | 7 | #14,322 | 4.0 |
| 2010 | 10 | #10,970 | 5.6 |
| 2009 | 9 | #12,117 | 4.9 |
| 2008 | 7 | #14,872 | 3.7 |
| 2007 | 8 | #13,490 | 4.2 |
| 2006 | 5 | #19,080 | 2.6 |
| 2005 | 8 | #12,616 | 4.3 |
| 2004 | 9 | #11,309 | 4.9 |
| 2003 | 9 | #11,004 | 4.9 |
| 2002 | 11 | #9,261 | 6.1 |
| 2001 | 6 | #14,727 | 3.3 |
| 2000 | 10 | #9,643 | 5.5 |
| 1999 | 7 | #12,213 | 3.9 |
| 1998 | 5 | #15,737 | 2.8 |
| 1997 | 5 | #15,286 | 2.9 |
| 1995 | 9 | #9,265 | 5.1 |
| 1994 | 5 | #14,915 | 2.8 |
| 1993 | 5 | #14,947 | 2.8 |
| 1992 | 7 | #11,260 | 3.8 |
| 1989 | 5 | #13,753 | 2.7 |
| 1986 | 5 | #12,115 | 2.9 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Merly a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Merly has been recorded only for girls: SSA lists no boys with the name in 32 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Merly: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Merly, and how old are they?
An estimated 239 Americans named Merly and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (99% of everyone recorded); the median is 18 years old and half are between 12 and 26. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 1,250 people named Merly (1,222 women and girls, 28 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 214 born in the U.S. The Census count is 5.8 times 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.
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 2,393 babies since 1880, Merly is the fifth most given (10% of them).
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 Merly
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 Merly and names like it
- Compare Merly and MerrilyBirths, ranks, peak and the living estimate side by side.
- The most given names of the 2010sMerly peaked in 2012.
- California’s most given namesThe state where SSA recorded the most babies named Merly since 1910.
- The top names of 2012The year the most babies were named Merly.
- The names of Generation ZMost people named Merly alive today were born 1997-2012.
- Names starting with MMost given first.