Mei

Spellings & scripts●

Locally spelled May in PL Poland, CH Switzerland, Meiling in FI Finland, BR Brazil, Мей in RU Russia, UA Ukraine and Mae in CZ Czechia.

Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records; ○ marks a model's transliteration. Click a spelling to open its page.

Meaning & origin●

Attested across 12 languages in the etymology graph.

Languages●

Language is read off each record's context, not declared by the bearer; a share is of all records for this spelling.

Other names spelled this way◐

Mei is also recorded as 4 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

• Malay given name113K records spelled Mei7 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Malaysia, Indonesia, United States, Singapore

  Languages: Malay, Indonesian

  Also written 'Mei, Mei', Méi, Mêi

• a separate given name40K records spelled Mei5 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in United States, China, United Kingdom, Netherlands

  Also written Méi, Meĭ, Meï

• English given name3.2K records spelled Mei149 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in United States, Thailand, Australia, United Kingdom

  Languages: English, Thai, Khmer

  Also written Mel, แม่, May, เมย์, เมย

• Finnish given name2.7K records spelled Mei3 spellings in the group

  Most recorded in Finland, United States, Malaysia, China

  Languages: Finnish, Estonian

  Also written Mëi

76 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Other recorded senses●

Mei is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

• In Chinese, from a patronymic or plural form of a short form of the personal names Bartolomeo, Romeo, or ToloMEO.

  as a name·Dictionary of American Family Names

• In Malay, May (fifth month of the Gregorian calendar)

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In English, A female given name from Mandarin.

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In Chinese, nonstandard spelling of méi

  as a word·kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

• In Italian, redução de Bartolomei; às vezes de Mattei ou Romei

  as a name·Dicionário dos sobrenomes italianos

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.

Over time●

US SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) — 66 years between 1947–2025. One register's own figures, never a sum across registers: two registers counting the same people would double them.

Notable people with this name●

• Hu Meib. 1958CNChinese director, television director and producer
• Mei Shigenobub. 1973JPJapanese journalist (1973-)
• Vanessa-Maeb. 1978SGnot in their usual nameBritish violinist
• Mei Finegoldb. 1982ILIsraeli singer
• Kurokawa Meib. 1987JPJapanese actress
• May'nb. 1989JPnot in their usual nameJapanese singer
• Jessie Mei Lib. 1995GBEnglish actress
• Mei Naganob. 1999JPJapanese actress (born 1999)
• Mei Yamazakib. 2005JPJapanese singer, dancer and model
• Mei SakuragaJPJapanese mangaka

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●

Register rows as of the 2026-09-12 data build · 536 rows in the corpus for this spelling.

Frequently asked questions

How common is the name Mei?

We estimate roughly 52 thousand people bear Mei (counting its spellings and scripts) across 11 countries in our records.

In which country does Mei have the most bearers?

Mei is most frequently recorded in Malaysia, where it is most often spelled mei.

How common is Mei compared with other names?

In Malaysia, Mei is the 68th most common given name of 325,158 given names recorded there.

Is Mei a male or female name?

Mei is a female 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.

What does the name Mei mean?

Recorded meaning: ‘Plum’. One of the three so-called ‘friends of winter’ (dong sanyou): plum (mei), pine (song), and bamboo (zhu), which stay green throughout the winter.