Kelvin
given name · Latin script
Meaning, in English: In the International System of Units, the base unit of thermodynamic temperature; ¹⁄_(273.16) of the thermodynamic temperature of the triple point of water. The unit symbol is "K"
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Kelvin is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country. In Hong Kong it is the 42nd most common given name.
- KEKenya≈1 in 214(inferred from the name graph)
- TZTanzania≈1 in 476
- HKHong Kong≈1 in 596
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 Kelvin 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)
- #751 (measured from records)
- 3 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 544 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 214 (inferred from the name graph)
≈550,000 named Calvin, est.
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Kenya, 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 Calvin in US United States, KE Kenya, TZ Tanzania 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)
Modern given name, first used in the 1920s and increasing in popularity from the 1950s onwards. It is taken from the name of the Scottish river which runs through Glasgow into the Clyde (compare Clyde). Its choice as a given name may also have been influenced by names such as Kevin and Melvin and the fame of the scientist Lord Kelvin (1824- 1907).
Sources 1
- A concise dictionary of first names
How Kelvin is read(measured from records)
Kelvin is one spelling over 4 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- English56%
In the International System of Units, the base unit of thermodynamic temperature; ¹⁄_(273.16) of the thermodynamic temperature of the triple point of water. The unit symbol is "K".
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
temperature scale; pers. name
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
- Spanish13%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Kelvin in Spanish.
- Swahili12%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Kelvin in Swahili.
- Portuguese5.7%
kelvin (SI temperature unit)
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Kelvin 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 | — | ≈550,000 est. | ≈1 in 2.5K | — | Calvin | 63 |
| KE Kenya | #382 | ≈250,000 est. | ≈1 in 214 | — | Calvin | 51 |
| NG Nigeria | #476 | ≈140,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.6K | — | Kelvin | 119 |
| US United States | #306 | 124,765as Calvin | 1 in 2.7K | 125K | Calvin | 544 |
| TZ Tanzania | #571 | ≈120,000 est. | ≈1 in 476 | — | Calvin | 39 |
| BR Brazil | — | 40,851 | 1 in 5.2K | 41K | — | 6 |
| HK Hong Kong | #42 | ≈12,000 est. | ≈1 in 596 | — | Kelvin | 102 |
| SG Singapore | #63 | ≈5,200 est. | ≈1 in 1.2K | — | Kelvin | 147 |
| GY Guyana | — | 613 | 1 in 1.2K | 613 | — | 11 |
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 — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; IBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror); Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025. 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)
Kelvin is also recorded in 3 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
Modern given name, first used in the 1920s and increasing in popularity from the 1950s onwards. It is taken from the name of the Scottish river which runs through Glasgow into the Clyde (compare Clyde). Its choice as a given name may also have been influenced by names such as Kevin and Melvin and the fame of the scientist Lord Kelvin (1824- 1907).
as a nameA concise dictionary of first names
In French, Unité physique de température (symbole K) prenant pour origine le zéro absolu. Dans ce système, la température de fusion de la glace se fait à 273,16 °K. Le nom vient de celui de sir William Thomson, lord Kelvin (1824-1907), mathématicien et physicien britannique qui découvrit en 1852 le refroidissement des gaz par détente.
as a name2500 noms propres devenus communs : dictionnaire étymologique (éponymes, antonomases et hypallages)
Del río estrecho
as a name25,000 nombres de bebé. La mejor guía para escoger el nombre adecuado
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)
- Kelvin Davisb. 1967NZNew Zealand politician
- Kelvin Davisb. 1976GBBritish footballer (born 1976)
- Kelvin Yub. 1979USAmerican actor
- K. C. Riversb. 1987USnot in their usual nameAmerican professional basketball player
- Kelvin Leerdamb. 1990NLSurinamese footballer
- Kelvin Mateus de Oliveirab. 1993BRBrazilian association football player
- Kelvin Harrison Jr.b. 1994USAmerican actor
- Kelvin Hoeflerb. 1994BRBrazilian skateboarder
- Kelvin Amianb. 1998FRFrench association football player
- Kelvin Kiptumb. 1999KEKenyan long-distance runner (1999–2024)
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 101 sources across 61 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 43K | #991 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror) | 2022 | 41K | — |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 40K | #659 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Nomes (census name API) | — | 28K | #1,152 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | 2020 | 2.8K | — |
| GY Guyana | Guyana — Official List of Electors July 2025 | 2025 | 613 | #137 |
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 371 | #659 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 214 | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 110 | #991 |
Reference works 2
- Wikipedia given-name 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
- Where does the name Kelvin come from?
- Modern given name, first used in the 1920s and increasing in popularity from the 1950s onwards. Recorded by A concise dictionary of first names.
- What does the name Kelvin mean?
- In English, In the International System of Units, the base unit of thermodynamic temperature; ¹⁄_(273.16) of the thermodynamic temperature of the triple point of water. The unit symbol is "K".
- Is Kelvin a male or female name?
- Kelvin is a male name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- In which country does Kelvin have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 551 thousand people named Calvin in China, more than in any other country we hold.
- How common is the name Kelvin?
- In Brazil, the national register counted 40,851 people named Kelvin in 2022, about 1 in 5.2 thousand residents.
- How common is Kelvin compared with other names?
- In Hong Kong, Kelvin is the 42nd most common given name of 23,276 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Kelvin?
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/kelvinThe 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, “Kelvin” — the 42nd most common given name in Hong Kong. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.