Boy names that work in English and German

[User7567]

German couple living in the UK. We had settled on Julian a long time ago - which would be pronounced Yoolian in German. Personally I don’t mind that people here will use the English pronounciation, I think it’s gorgeous in English. I found myself using both pronounciations interchangeably…however, DH suddenly thinks it’s too weird to use two different pronounciations. So we agreed to start thinking about new names, but I’m at a loss. He wants a German name that also works in English and is pronounced the same (ish).

So far we only have found Finn as a potential, I like it but don’t love it.

Apart from Julian, I like Jonah / Jonas, but same issue with German/English pronunciation.

I also like Fabian but can’t use it.

Lucas/Lukas? Matthias is unusual but not unknown in English. Marcus. Karl.

Markus?

Otto
Max
Andreas

Peter , Ben , Felix, Marcus and Oscar spring to mind .

I understand where your husband is coming from but my Brother and DS both have names that are pronounced differently in Germany and it was never an issue. DS in particular seemed to quite like it and was pleased when that side of the family gave him a German shortening for his name,

Oscar
Jon
Otto
Frank
Lars
Sebastian
Thomas
Fabian
Christophe
Mark/Marcus
Max
Stefan
Daniel
Jacob
Alex
David
Marius
Felix
Conrad
Christian
Jonas
Magnus
Peter

I just pulled these from my German friends on Facebook to give you a flavour 🇩🇪

DH is German and we have an Oscar, I was going to spell it with a K but nobody can ever spell our last name so I felt it was best to give him at least one easy name!

Ben, Leo, Tim, Bernhard, Max, Mark, Leon, Liam

Thank you. I like some of the ideas, such as Matthias, haven’t thought about that one yet. I’ll add some suggestions to the list to discuss with DH tonight…baby boy due in 2 weeks, time is running out 😅

Thomas, Karl, Paul, Peter, Matt, Sven (Norwegian, actually), Leon, Tim, Kris,

off the top off my head. Sorry if already mentioned

I also have a German DH, he has a popular German name beginning with C. Before we had kids we agreed I would name boys and he would name girls. We had 2 girls, but I really liked the names Henning and Günter.

I know a Julian and a Jonas who go between German/French/British pronunciations and also a Theo with a pronunciation switch. I reckon it's all fine as long as you like both versions and don't mind explaining sometimes. There's so much variety in names now. If you love a name don't let a small worry become a dealbreaker too easily.

My German/English friends between them have an Alex, Daniel, Ben, and, yes, a Julian.

Otto? Karl?

Was also going to suggest Henning. Lovely name and no pronunciation or spelling issues.

Thomas? As in Muller. I have a long-ish German surname and my kids have short names that are definitely English but work fine if you also want to sound German.

Managed to fish out our long list from when we were having the same chat...

Otto, Matteo, Matthias (Matti), Eric/Erik (OH liked Erich but I think Brits would say the 'ch' at the end)
Max, Frederik, Louis, Ben
Rudi, Leon, Kristof/Christoph, Luca
Bertie, Rolf/Ralf, Oskar, Adam
Nikolaus (Nico), Alex/Alexi, Bjorn, Hugo
Sebastian, Thomas, Emil, Carsten
Phillip, Nate, Tobias (Tobi), Michael (Micki)

I agree with your husband about having the same pronunciation.
My DD is half Turkish and we intentionally chose a name that would be written and pronounced the same in both English and Turkish.

Also can offer a 'game' if you like. My OH and I did it for both our children. Was an interesting way to spend an evening and brought some fun into the decision for us. Also fun to choose one name per letter, throws out some interesting results!

Stage 1

1. Each write one name per letter of the alphabet on individual bits of paper, so you each have 26 small bits of paper in front of you (Adam, Ben, Carston, Daniel etc)
2. Pull one name from each pile and put them next to eachother on the table to compare.
3. Choose the fave name from those to to go into a 'winners' pile. Then draw the next 2 names.
4. Eventually your winners pile will have 26 names in it. Discard the rest.

Stage 2 - winner stays on

1. Pull 2 names from the winners pile to compare. This time choose the name you like best, keep that one on the table and discard the other.
2. Draw another and keep the favourite again.
3. Repeat for all 26 until you have the winning name.

This is how we chose the first and middle name combo for our son. Two names came out against eachother and we couldn't decide which one we liked best so we chose them both together!

Alexander
Thomas

I love Jurgen.

I live in a German speaking country and I meet a lot of babies called Leo, Max, Alex, Lukas, Noah, all very similar pronunciation.

There are also loads of baby Paul's here which never struck me as a cute name but now I think it's adorable. Slightly different pronunciation though and not sure the UK is ready for a Paul resurgence...

You'd be very surprised at the differences in pronunciation between names that look as if they ought to be pronounced the same. Even something like Oscar (good call, actually) - Oscaaahh vs Oscuh. if you want the exact same pronunciation you're basically limited to Max. Edit: Or Finn, which - I agree with you - isn't particularly inspiring.

If you live in the UK I think I would actually go for Julian, as long as you can live with your family's German side attempting to pronounce it the English way and coming out with something like 'Choolienn' Day to day, he will have the 'nice' pronunciation.

If you like Fabian then what about Florian?

I have a half German nephew Tobias... suits him and works well for both sides of the family.

@User7567

I thought that you might find this interesting, OP.

https://www.beliebte-vornamen.de/jahrgang/j2023/top-500-2023