Merryl
Merryl was last recorded in 1970, when 6 babies were given it; 250 Americans have been recorded with it between 1943 and 1970 (Social Security Administration, published May 2026).
Girls and boys together; gaps are years SSA did not record (fewer than 5 births).
Births of Merryl by year: SSA national baby-name file, 1880-2025, published May 8, 2026. SSA’s notes on the data.
How popular is Merryl?
Unranked in 2025
Its last girls’ rank on record is #7,653, in 1970; SSA lists a name only in years with 5 or more births.
21 babies in 1955, the peak
Merryl peaked in 1955, when 21 girls were given it, #2,445 among girls’ names. It was not recorded in 2025.
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1970 | 6 | #7,653 | 3.4 |
| 1967 | 7 | #5,843 | 4.2 |
| 1965 | 5 | #7,188 | 2.8 |
| 1964 | 8 | #5,306 | 4.2 |
| 1963 | 10 | #4,445 | 5.2 |
| 1962 | 8 | #5,148 | 4.1 |
| 1961 | 7 | #5,669 | 3.5 |
| 1959 | 7 | #5,388 | 3.5 |
| 1958 | 7 | #5,243 | 3.5 |
| 1957 | 10 | #4,104 | 4.9 |
Every recorded year (24)
| Year | Births | Rank | Per million girls |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1956 | 9 | #4,365 | 4.5 |
| 1955 | 21 | #2,445 | 10.7 |
| 1954 | 13 | #3,268 | 6.7 |
| 1953 | 16 | #2,777 | 8.5 |
| 1952 | 19 | #2,478 | 10.2 |
| 1951 | 16 | #2,657 | 8.9 |
| 1950 | 13 | #2,996 | 7.6 |
| 1949 | 5 | #5,778 | 2.9 |
| 1948 | 10 | #3,517 | 5.9 |
| 1947 | 17 | #2,508 | 9.6 |
| 1946 | 10 | #3,368 | 6.4 |
| 1945 | 11 | #2,863 | 8.4 |
| 1944 | 7 | #3,950 | 5.3 |
| 1943 | 8 | #3,714 | 5.7 |
Ranks and shares: girls’ names in each year’s SSA file; share of all girls SSA recorded that year.
Is Merryl a boy’s or a girl’s name?
Merryl has been recorded only for girls: SSA lists no boys with the name in 24 years of records (it lists a name only in years with 5 or more babies of a sex).
Girls and boys named Merryl: the SSA national file counts each sex separately.
How many people are named Merryl, and how old are they?
An estimated 188 Americans named Merryl and born in the U.S. are alive in 2026 (75% of everyone recorded); the median is 72 years old and half are between 67 and 76. An estimate from SSA’s births and life tables, not a count.
The 2020 Census counted 361 people named Merryl (339 women and girls, 22 men and boys). SSA’s births carried forward to Census day, April 1, 2020, predict 207 born in the U.S. The Census count is 1.7 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
Merryl is a less common spelling of Meryl: SSA has recorded 250 Merryl and 5,599 Meryl since 1880.
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. Some are separate names, not spellings of one.
Names that rose and fell in the same decades as Merryl
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.