Stephen
Meaning of Stephen
Stephen is a time-honoured classic with roots in the Greek word “stéphanos,” meaning “crown” or “wreath”—the very symbol of victory that, in an Indian wedding, might echo the sweet-scented varmala placed around the groom’s neck. Through history, the name has worn many garlands: Saint Stephen, the first Christian martyr, lent it spiritual gravitas; King Stephen of England added royal heft; modern luminaries such as physicist Stephen Hawking and storyteller Stephen King remind us that a sharp mind and a vivid imagination can happily share the same crown. In the United States, Stephen surged to peak popularity in the 1950s and 60s, when new parents seemed to queue up for the name like devotees at a temple fair, yet it still holds a respectable place on today’s charts, offering a blend of tradition and quiet charisma. Warm, steady, and just a touch scholarly, Stephen feels like that friendly professor who can crack a gentle joke while guiding you through the cosmos—an appealing role model for any little boy destined to wear his own laurel of accomplishments.
Pronunciation
English
- Pronunced as STEE-vuhn (/ˈsti.vən/)
U.S. Popularity Chart
States Popularity Chart
Notable People Named Stephen
| Stephen Curry - Steph Curry is an American point guard for the Golden State Warriors, widely regarded as the greatest shooter in basketball history and credited with popularizing the three point shot. |
| Stephen Hawking was an English theoretical physicist and author who advanced cosmology, serving as Lucasian Professor of Mathematics at Cambridge and later directing research at its Centre for Theoretical Cosmology. |
| Stephen Colbert is an American comedian, writer, and television host best known for The Colbert Report and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. |
| Stephen Edwin King is an American author known as the King of Horror, famed for his horror novels and about 200 short stories across suspense, crime, science fiction, fantasy, and mystery. |
| Sir Stephen Fry is an English actor, comedian, broadcaster, and writer, famed for Fry and Laurie, Blackadder, and Jeeves and Wooster, former host of QI, president of Mind since 2011, and knighted in 2025 for services to mental health, the environment, and charity. |
| Stephen Crane was a prolific American poet, novelist, and short story writer whose realist and early naturalist and impressionist works made him one of the most innovative voices of his generation. |
| Stephen Hillenburg was an American animator and marine biology educator who created Nickelodeon's SpongeBob SquarePants in 1999, now the fourth longest-running US animated series, and voiced Potty the Parrot. |
| Stephen Gerald Breyer is an American lawyer and retired US Supreme Court justice, nominated by President Bill Clinton, who served from 1994 to 2022, was associated with the liberal wing of the Court, and now teaches at Harvard Law School. |
| Stephen Fuller Austin was an American born empresario known as the Father of Texas who led the successful 1825 colonization of Tejas by bringing 300 families from the United States. |
| Stephen Edward Ambrose was an American historian and bestselling author of World War II works and biographies of Presidents Eisenhower and Nixon, and a longtime University of New Orleans history professor. |
| Stephen Foster, the father of American music, was a Romantic era American composer who wrote over 200 parlour and folk songs, including Oh Susanna and Beautiful Dreamer, that remain popular today. |
| Stephen Merchant is an English comedian, writer, director, and actor best known for co creating The Office and collaborating with Ricky Gervais on Extras, Lifes Too Short, and The Ricky Gervais Show, as well as voicing Wheatley in Portal 2. |
| Stephen Glass is a former American journalist whose 1995 to 1998 stint at The New Republic ended after an internal investigation found most of his stories were fabricated. |
| Stephen Wolfram is a British American computer scientist, physicist, and businessman known for his work in computer algebra and theoretical physics, and he was named a fellow of the American Mathematical Society in 2012. |
| Stephen Richards Covey was an American educator, author, businessman, and speaker best known for The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People, named by Time magazine as one of the 25 most influential people in 1996, and later a professor at Utah State University. |
