Great name, but don’t spell it as Stephen. Stephen and Steven are pronounced the same in the U.S. You’ll want to spell it as Stefan.

Anonymous wrote:The thing about naming a boy Stefan, but spelling it Stephen/Steven, is that every time he corrects someone with the correct pronunciation he will sound pretentious. No, it's Stef fen.

It doesn’t help that the only Stefan that I’ve ever met was super conceited and pretentious. He came from a wealthy background and quite literally thought that he was God’s gift to the world. His parents were immigrants from Europe (either Croatia or Serbia - can’t remember at the moment). It’s not a very common name here in the US.

They’re overreacting. It’s cute and also on my baby name list. We might put it in the middle name spot because I want to use an honor name as the first name.

If is spelled Stephen he will be called Steven in the US.

Anonymous wrote:It’s my brother’s name! But spelled Stefan. Friends call him Stef. I’m biased but I love it.

It's a great name when spelled properly, as is your brother's.

The thing about naming a boy Stefan, but spelling it Stephen/Steven, is that every time he corrects someone with the correct pronunciation he will sound pretentious. No, it's Stef fen.

Anonymous wrote:Stephen is pronounced Steven. Nobody will pronounce it Stefan.

Even worse, kids will call him Stephanie if you call him Stefan/Steff.

He will undoubtedly opt to call himself Steve or steven—even if you name him Stefan.

Don’t do this to your kid.

He’d probably be more likely to be teased about being named Steve. Steve is considered kind of lame to the newer generations. It’s not quite ready for a comeback or old enough to be fashionable again. I highly doubt a baby born in this decade would opt to call himself Steve(n) if his parents named him Stefan.

It’s my brother’s name! But spelled Stefan. Friends call him Stef. I’m biased but I love it.

No one will pronounce it correctly unless you spell it Stefan.

As everyone else has said, Stephen is a fine name. Pronouncing it "Steffen" is not. It makes you look either ignorant, like you didn't know the standard pronunciation, or affected, like you want to be special and condemn your kid to a lifetime of correcting everyone due to your own whims.

Please don't do this to your kid. Either pronounce it Steven like everyone else does, or spell it Stefan.

With that spelling he will be called Steven. Please spell it Steffan and save the kid a lifetime of correcting people.

So bad. Awful.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I mean, because that's not the standard pronunciation.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/pronunciation/english/stephen

So either change it to Stefan or get used to it being pronounced the same as Steven.

Based on the information given in the post, I think the OP’s mom is only pronouncing it the same as Steven because she hates Stephen, knows the OP hates the Steven pronunciation, and is trying to get them to change it to an entirely different name by annoying them with Steven.

In my experience Stephen is pronounced as “Steve-n”. If you want “Stef-an” you spell it “Stephan”

It's like naming your kid Thomas but insisting everyone pronounce the TH sound. There's a logic there but reasonably, it's just not happening.

Stephen is pronounced Steven. Nobody will pronounce it Stefan.

Even worse, kids will call him Stephanie if you call him Stefan/Steff.

He will undoubtedly opt to call himself Steve or steven—even if you name him Stefan.

Don’t do this to your kid.