Welsh names for English speakers

[a1yumi]

My partner is Welsh and would love to honour this side of his heritage in calling our child by a Welsh name. My family is English and that's where we live so would like something nice but pronouncable! Anyone have any ideas? We don't know the gender.

Id like it to be something not too common, e..g I heard Seren is really popular these days.

Alys
Bethan
Carys
Eira
Mabli
Nia
Anwen
Tesni

Aled
Idris
Emrys
Macsen
Emlyn
Iestyn
Ioan
Rhodri
Tomos
Rhydian

There was recently a thread similar to this for girls’ names:

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/baby_names/5565984-welsh-baby-names-that-english-family-can-pronounce-easily

My contribution was to go through the top 100 names in England and Wales and offer my very uneducated guess at pronunciation of anything that looked a bit Welsh, perhaps giving you I sight into the pitfalls of any names :

Girls:
Mali (like the African country)
Alys (Alice)
Mabli (No idea but this thread taught me and it seems obvious and pretty!)
Ffion (Fee-on)
Lili (is this Welsh? I’d guess Lily?)
Seren (se-ren - se like sai in said)
Nansi (Nancy)
Eira (ey-ra - ey like Spey)
Efa (e-fa - e like egg)
Elsi (Elsie)
Eleri (Celery without the C)
Lowri (Lowry)
Anwen (Ann-win)

Boys:
Osian (Oh-see-an)
Macsen (Mac-sin)
Harri (Harry)
Jac (Jack)
Dylan (Is this Welsh or just me projecting?)
Elis (Ellis)
Tomos (Thomas)
Emrys (Em-ris)
Dewi (dew-y)
Gruffydd (Gruff-Ed)

I think Eira and Ioan would be mispronounced frequently.
Lovely names though.

Edited to add I am Welsh, my children have Welsh names, this is just my experience of multi-vowel names read by English people.

A poster above has written their interpretations of your names, most of them I thought would be fine, but apparently not.

Anwen (for example) would be Anwen (with the e sound of ‘when’ not Anwin, as they said)

Seren is definitely popular, but very pretty sounding. My Welsh neighbours had a Manon, which I liked.

My favourite Welsh girls name is Rhiannon. And for a boy I like Rhodri.
I’m Welsh and would pronounce Eira as Eye-ra.

Lowri is my favourite for girls and Macsen for boys

@a1yumi ,give the baby a name you love and a Welsh middle name.
@FunnyOrca has given insight into how likely the names are to be mispronounced.

Girls:
Mali - Mally
Alys (Alice)
Mabli - Mabbly
Ffion (Fee-on)
Lili - Lily
Seren - SERR-enn
Nansi (Nancy)
Eira - nearest approximation is EY-rah
Efa - EV-ah (ev like in ever)
Elsi (Elsie)
Eleri - El-ERR-y (rhymes with Kerry)
Lowri (Lowry) - nearest approximation is LOW-ry (Ow like in Owen)
Anwen (Ann-win) ANN-wenn
Boys:
Osian (Oh-see-an) - OSH-ann
Macsen (Mac-sin) - MAX-enn
Harri (Harry)
Jac (Jack)
Dylan - DULL-ann
Elis (Ellis)
Tomos (Thomas) - TOM-oss
Emrys (Em-ris)
Dewi - nearest approximation is DEH-wy (like Derry said by Jonathan Ross)
Gruffydd - Griffith, th like in this.

Manon - MAN-onn
Ioan - YO-ann
Rhodri - nearest approximation is Rodry
Rhiannon - nearest approximation is Ree-ANN-onn
(RH is one letter and is like R and H said at the same time)

Long and boring post alert
The intention being to avoid names that need explaining, spelling or correcting.
The 'you only have to correct someone once' is not true, and even if it was you'd still have to do it a lot.

I'd avoid names

• with sounds that you don't get in English (LL, RH, CH)
• with more than one syllable because the unstressed vowels will be a schwa and the wrong syllable might be stressed
• with a C or G before I, E or Y
• with diphthongs like ei, eu, ai, au, aw, ia, ie, ieu, io, ow
• ending in -o
• containing a DD or a F
• with a U
• with an R that's not at the beginning
• names that have the mispronunciation established (eg Rhys, Dylan)

I'd pick a name

• that is easy to spell and sounds exactly the same in Welsh and English but not many are current.
• an anglicized Welsh name (e.g. Lloyd, Owen, Vaughan)
• something like Arthur

David would be a good choice for a boy.
I'd probably pick a name that is from the Bible that doesn't sound too different in Welsh and English (e.g. Daniel, Ruth, Miriam, Ann/Anna, Sarah, Martha) or something like Sara or Lara.

I don't think that names like Jac, Harri, Nansi or Lili look great in England but they are popular in Wales.