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Malene

Girls' name

Short form of Magdalena

Malene has been given to 164 babies in the U.S. since 1919. It was used fewer than 5 times in 2025, so it doesn't appear in the latest year's list — today it's a genuinely uncommon pick. Its peak year was 1977, with 10 recorded.

Babies named Malene, 2006

1 in 791,000

Malene over time, 1880–2025

Girls
02.557.51018801900192019401960198020002020

Based on births in the U.S. Babies given the name each year. Hover the chart — or focus it and use the arrow keys — for any year. Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Malene: meaning, origin, and history

Short form of Magdalena

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Malene means

Malene is a short form of Magdalena.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Malene is used in Danish and Norwegian.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Malene → Magdalena → Magdalena. The family’s meaning is “woman from Magdala”, recorded in Spanish with the source elements Magdalēnḗ.

Origin, language, and formation

Malene is used in Danish and Norwegian Nynorsk.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Magdalena and Magdalene.

Pronunciation and spelling

In Norwegian Nynorsk, Malene is pronounced /maːˈleːne/.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 164 girls were recorded with the name Malene between 1919 and 2006. Its highest annual count was 10 in 1977; its best national rank was #3,645 in 1939.

Sources & methodologyReferences, data & attribution

Meaning, origin, and language notes draw on the references below.

American popularity figures use published Social Security Administration records for this exact spelling. Counts below five for a name, sex, and year are omitted.

Wiktionary material is available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

How common is Malene?

Malene had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2006, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2006
1 in 791,000
5 of 3,956,166 births
Among girls only
1 in 380,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2006
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
548,442 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Malene sits on the popularity scale

Rarest published (5 a year)#1 — Olivia (13,544)

Chance at least one other child shares the name

If the other children were drawn at random from the 2006 national name distribution. Real classrooms cluster by region and community, so treat these as a floor, not a ceiling.

Class of 20Under 1%
Class of 30Under 1%
Grade of 100Under 1%
School of 500Under 1%

Put another way: gather 548,442 children born in 2006 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Malene. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Malenes were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Malene was born before 1976 — so the typical Malene is around 49 today.

Median birth year
1976
About 49 years old
Biggest decade
1970s
34.1% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
26.2%
Spread across generations
Recorded since 1950
120
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1970s — 34.1% of all recorded uses (56).

Is Malene rising or falling?

Rank movement and count movement can disagree — the number of distinct names in use keeps growing, so a name holding a steady count still slides down the list. Both are shown.

Rank vs 1 year ago
—
Not ranked then
Rank vs 5 years ago
New entry
Not ranked then
Rank vs 10 years ago
—
Not ranked then
Births vs 10 years ago
—
Not published both years
Share of its own peak
0%
Peak was 1977 (10)
Years since peak
48
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Volatile
28.5% average annual change
Best rank ever
#3,645
1939

Spellings of Malene

Malene is not the most common spelling — Darlene is, with 19.5% against Malene's 0.02%.

Grouped by closeness of spelling (up to two letter changes), same sex, with a floor on all-time use. It catches Sophia/Sofia and Aiden/Ayden, and misses spellings that sound alike but look different, like Sean and Shawn.

Malene around the world

Where Malene ranks in official birth records elsewhere in the world. Rankings only — the number of births isn’t comparable between places, so it isn’t shown.

  • France
    1999–1999
    #4,186
    in 1999
  • Norway
    1880–2025
    #315
    in 2025

Popularity data from Institut national de la statistique et des études économiques and Statistics Norway. INSEE data under Licence Ouverte / Etalab 2.0. SSB data under CC BY 4.0.

Malene by the numbers

The raw record for each sex the name is used for.

As a girl's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#3,645
1939
Peak year
1977
10 that year
First recorded
1919
Last recorded
2006
All-time count
164
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Malene

Matched on shared beginnings and endings, similar length, and comparable popularity.

MalibuMalleyMalkiaMalyahMalkieMalaakMaloneMalynMallyMalonieMalekaMalaniiMalaiaMalaiMalanMalaiahMalahniMaloniMaleekaMaleighMalenyMaleyaMalanniMalli

Sibling names for Malene

Names from the same era and popularity tier — the two things that make a sibling set feel deliberate — skipping lookalike spellings and shared initials.

Explore around Malene

Top names of 1977, Malene's peak yearThe 1970s in fullOther names that peaked in 1939Girls' names starting with M