Molly
- Pronunciation
- [Mo-lly]
- Gender
- Female
- Meaning
- Bitter
- Origin
- Hebrew
About the Name Molly
Molly originated as an English short form of Mary (see separate entry on Mary for the Hebrew Miryam etymology), through a medieval pet form of Mary into Mally and finally Molly. The name has been used continuously in English-speaking countries since at least the 17th century, transitioning gradually from nickname to standalone first name through the 19th and 20th centuries.
Notable bearers include the legendary Revolutionary War heroine Molly Pitcher (popularly identified with Mary Ludwig Hays, c. 1754–1832, who reportedly carried water to Continental soldiers at the 1778 Battle of Monmouth and took her wounded husband's place at the cannon); American actress Molly Ringwald (the iconic 1980s John Hughes actress, Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink, The Breakfast Club); the fictional Molly Bloom (the closing-monologue character of James Joyce's Ulysses, 1922 — one of the iconic literary characters of 20th-century modernism); and the chemistry-teacher-turned-meth-cook character Molly in Breaking Bad.
The contemporary American Molly surge is part of the broader vintage-revival wave alongside other shortened/diminutive forms like Sadie and Maggie. The name climbed from outside the US top 200 in 1990 to the US top 100 girls' rank by 2003 and has held a top-200 range since. The name's appeal is its compact warm register — two short syllables, soft consonants, instantly readable, and the in-built friendly-vintage register that contrasts with longer formal names. The name reads as both classical and approachable. Common nicknames are scarce since Molly is itself a nickname-shape — Mol, Molls, and the rare Pol (a related medieval English diminutive) each carry distinct registers; the longer formal Mary is sometimes used as Molly's official-document version. International variants are minimal since the name is essentially English; the related Mary family across European languages provides adjacent cultural anchors.
Source: U.S. Social Security Administration name data, 1880–2024 (methodology). By Marvin Tang.
Quick Facts About Molly
US Popularity History (1987–2025)
Annual US births named Molly by gender, from US Social Security Administration records. Peak year: 1991 with 4,652 girls named Molly (girl rank #74 that year).
Where it stands today: in 2025, ranked #196 for girls (1,601 US births). That's 122 places below its 1991 peak.
Source: US Social Security Administration. Limitations: US birth-certificate data only; names appearing fewer than 5 times in a given year are suppressed for privacy; spelling variants are counted separately. For names that ranked outside the US top 100 before year 2000, only the years they reached the top 100 are shown — the chart may have gaps for less-popular historical names.
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Where in the US Is Molly Most Popular?
Average girl-name rank within each state across 2016–2025 SSA records. A lower number means the name appears closer to the top of that state's girls-name rankings — a per-capita measure that isn't biased toward large states. For Molly the strongest states are Wyoming, Vermont, Massachusetts.
Strongest girls-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Wyoming | #77 | 26 |
| 2 | Vermont | #92 | 33 |
| 3 | Massachusetts | #96 | 545 |
| 4 | Pennsylvania | #114 | 839 |
| 5 | Connecticut | #115 | 246 |
| 6 | Illinois | #115 | 838 |
| 7 | Utah | #117 | 341 |
| 8 | New Hampshire | #117 | 105 |
| 9 | Maine | #121 | 89 |
| 10 | Alaska | #137 | 34 |
Weakest girls-name states
| # | State | Avg rank | Births |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | California | #383 | 892 |
| 2 | New Mexico | #375 | 27 |
| 3 | Nevada | #374 | 59 |
| 4 | Florida | #354 | 479 |
| 5 | Arizona | #352 | 200 |
| 6 | Texas | #300 | 1,020 |
| 7 | West Virginia | #284 | 48 |
| 8 | Georgia | #266 | 390 |
| 9 | Arkansas | #259 | 124 |
| 10 | Oklahoma | #227 | 172 |
Source: SSA state-level baby-name dataset 2016–2025. States with fewer than 3 years of data for Molly in this window are excluded. Births < 5 in a given state-year are suppressed by SSA for privacy.
Variant Forms
Famous People Named Molly
2 notable figures from history and culture who share the name Molly.
- Molly Ringwald — Movie Actress (1968)
- Molly Shannon — Comedian (1964)
Looking for names like Molly?
A dedicated page with 60+ related names — spelling variants, rhymes, alliterations, same-origin matches, and shared meaning concepts — lives at its own URL so each kind of similarity gets a deeper treatment than fits here.
Compare Molly to Other Popular Names
Side-by-side popularity charts and crossover years for Molly against today's most popular girls-name peers (top 8 by US births in the last 10 years of SSA records).
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