# Mahmud (first name)

Source: https://namelineage.com/first-name/mahmud/  
Publisher: Name Lineage. US counts from the Social Security Administration; England and Wales counts from the Office for National Statistics; meaning and etymology from Wiktionary. Data updated 2026-11-11.

| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Usually given to | boys |
| Origin | Arabic |
| Meaning | “praised”, “laudable”, “to praise” |
| Pronunciation | not recorded |
| Nicknames | none recorded |
| Variant spellings | Mahmut, Mahmoud, Mahmood, Mahmout, Mehmud, Mehmood, Mehmut |
| US babies named this | 244 since 1880 |
| Boys / girls in the US | 244 / 0 (0% girls) |
| Babies in England and Wales | 113, 1996 to 2025 |

## Etymology

Transliteration of Arabic مَحْمُود (maḥmūd, literally “praised, laudable”), the passive participle of the Form I verb حَمِدَ (ḥamida, “to praise”), from the triconsonantal root ح م د (ḥ m d). The name Muhammad comes from the same root, and has a similar meaning.

## What it means

Mahmud is grouped under famous.

## Popularity

The last 15 years of each series. A year is missing when too few babies were given the name for the agency to publish it: five in the US, three in England and Wales.

### United States, boys

| Year | Babies | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 5 | 13,516 |
| 2011 | 10 | 7,870 |
| 2013 | 7 | 10,330 |
| 2014 | 10 | 7,922 |
| 2015 | 5 | 13,296 |
| 2016 | 14 | 6,221 |
| 2017 | 6 | 11,653 |
| 2018 | 15 | 5,944 |
| 2019 | 11 | 7,446 |
| 2020 | 8 | 9,236 |
| 2021 | 8 | 9,368 |
| 2022 | 19 | 5,146 |
| 2023 | 7 | 10,371 |
| 2024 | 11 | 7,560 |
| 2025 | 5 | 13,191 |

### England and Wales, boys

| Year | Babies | Rank |
|---|---|---|
| 2008 | 8 | 2,276 |
| 2009 | 4 | 3,744 |
| 2010 | 4 | 3,865 |
| 2011 | 4 | 3,830 |
| 2012 | 5 | 3,416 |
| 2013 | 4 | 3,822 |
| 2015 | 4 | 3,908 |
| 2017 | 6 | 3,040 |
| 2019 | 9 | 2,266 |
| 2020 | 4 | 3,848 |
| 2021 | 4 | 3,990 |
| 2022 | 4 | 4,001 |
| 2023 | 8 | 2,546 |
| 2024 | 4 | 4,270 |
| 2025 | 5 | 3,684 |

## In other languages

- Arabic: مَحْمُود
- Chinese: 馬哈茂德 /马哈茂德
- Hebrew: מַחְמוּד
- Hindi: महमूद
- Russian: Махму́д
- Turkish: Mahmut

## People named Mahmud

- Mahmud al-Kashgari, 11th-century Turkic scholar and lexicographer
- Abu-Mahmud Khujandi, 10th-century Persian astronomer and mathematician
- Mahmud Shah Durrani, 1801 to 1803 and 1809 to 1818
- Mahmud Tarzi, Afghan politician, secular activist and journalist (1865–1933)
- Mahmud Taymur, Egyptian writer (1894–1973)
- Mahmud Yalavach, 13th century Muslim administrator
- Mahmud Fahmi al-Nuqrashi, Egyptian politician (1888-1948)
- Mahmud al-Muntasir, former Prime Minister of Libya (1903-1970)
- Mahmud Qurbanov, association football player from Azerbaijan
- Mahmud Khalji, 15th-century sultan of the Malwa Sultanate
- Mahmud Shah, 8th Sultan of Malacca
- Mahmud ibn Muhammad, Bey of Tunis (1814-1824)

## How to read these numbers

A count is babies registered with that name in that year, not people alive now, so a name common a century ago can have a large total and few recent births.