Name Awesome

Marva

Girls' name

Feminine form of Marvin

Marva has been given to 10,369 babies in the U.S. since 1913. 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 1948, with 371 recorded.

Babies named Marva, 2023

1 in 663,000

Marva over time, 1880–2025

GirlsBoys
010020030040018801900192019401960198020002020

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 Gaps mean the name was given fewer than 5 times that year; these counts are unpublished.

Marva: meaning, origin, and history

Feminine form of Marvin

Deeper origin not confirmed in the cited records

What Marva means

Marva is a feminine form of Marvin.

Documented naming usage and pronunciation

Marva is used in English.

Another recorded pronunciation is /ˈmɑɹ.və/ for Marva.

Meaning behind the documented name family

The name developed through Marva → Marvin. The family’s proposed meaning is “marrow + eminent”, recorded in English with the source elements mer and myn.

Related names and everyday forms

Related names include Marvin.

American usage and historical context

In the United States, 10,362 girls were recorded with the name Marva between 1913 and 2023. Its highest annual count was 371 in 1948; its best national rank was #334 in 1936.

In the United States, 7 boys were recorded with the name Marva between 1936 and 1936. Its highest annual count was 7 in 1936; its best national rank was #3,059 in 1936.

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 Marva?

Marva had fewer than 5 recorded uses in 2025, so these figures use 2023, the last year it was published.

Among all babies, 2023
1 in 663,000
5 of 3,314,783 births
Among girls only
1 in 321,000
<0.01% of girls
Rank, 2023
Unranked
Fewer than 5 uses
Coin-flip room size
459,528 kids
Even odds of a second one

Where Marva 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 2023 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 459,528 children born in 2023 and it's an even bet that one of them is another Marva. In a class of 30 the chance is Under 1%.

When Marvas were born

Half of everyone ever recorded as Marva was born before 1949 — so the typical Marva is around 76 today.

Median birth year
1949
About 76 years old
Biggest decade
1940s
30.1% of all use
Born in the last 25 years
0.48%
Mostly a past generation
Recorded since 1950
4,926
People you could plausibly meet
Choose a decade

1940s — 30.1% of all recorded uses (3,115).

Is Marva 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 1948 (371)
Years since peak
77
Years
Year-to-year steadiness
Shifting
24.8% average annual change
Best rank ever
#334
1936

Spellings of Marva

Marva is not the most common spelling — Mary is, with 46.8% against Marva's 0.12%.

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.

Where Marva is used

Across 1910–2025, Marva was most concentrated in Utah — about 1 in 4,762 girls, against 1 in 18,998 across all states with data. It was least common in Wisconsin (1 in —).

021 per 100,000

Most concentrated

  1. 1Utah1 in 4,762
  2. 2Idaho1 in 6,667
  3. 3Arkansas1 in 7,143
  4. 4Louisiana1 in 7,143
  5. 5Mississippi1 in 7,692
  6. 6Oklahoma1 in 9,091
  7. 7Kansas1 in 10,000
  8. 8Alabama1 in 12,500

Shading is the share of that state's recorded girls given this name, not the raw count — otherwise the map would just show which states are biggest. Unshaded states have no published records for this period. U.S. birth records suppress state-year counts below 5; state counts therefore don't add up to the national total. Every state links to its full rankings. Marva has too little recent state data to map, so this covers all years from 1910.

Marva around the world

Where Marva 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.

  • England & Wales
    2001–2011
    #4,049
    in 2011
  • Canada
    2006–2006
    #2,939
    in 2006
  • South Australia
    2009–2009
    #818
    in 2009

Popularity data from Office for National Statistics, Statistics Canada and Consumer and Business Services (South Australia). ONS data under Open Government Licence v3.0. StatCan data under Statistics Canada Open Licence. CBS SA data under CC BY 4.0.

Notable people named Marva

People whose public names include Marva, backed by Wikidata given-name records and ordered by linked Wikimedia pages. The name may be a middle name.

People data from Wikidata (CC0). Fame is measured, not judged — the order reflects how widely each person is documented, not the U.S. birth records popularity this page is otherwise about.

Marva 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
#334
1936
Peak year
1948
371 that year
First recorded
1913
Last recorded
2023
All-time count
10,362
Count in 2025
Under 5

As a boy's name

Rank in 2025
Unranked
Trend vs 5 yrs ago
—
Best rank ever
#3,059
1936
Peak year
1936
7 that year
First recorded
1936
Last recorded
1936
All-time count
7
Count in 2025
Under 5

Names similar to Marva

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

MarenMarciMarloMartaMarinMarcyMartiMartyMargoMaryamMarielMarniMaryjoMarcieMarlynMariMarynMarnieMarleeMarliMarlaMariamMarisMarlen

Names with a curve like Marva

Not spelling — timing. These names rose, peaked and faded in the same years as Marva, so they read as being from the same moment even when they look nothing alike.

DeloisKayeMarileeSherrillClaudetteDarleenCharleenJerriePeggieCarleneMarylouDian

Sibling names for Marva

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 Marva

Top names of 1948, Marva's peak yearThe 1940s in fullOther names that peaked in 1936Girls' names starting with M