Cliff Clavin approves.
this post was submitted on 10 Mar 2026
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Depends what variety of Cliff you are:
This is amazing
No, you're amazing 5too!
Edit:
It's good 👍. People might assume it's short for Clifford.
That's generally a very safe assumption!
Btw, someone mentioned the name being a bit old-timey, and it is. But I think it's one of the ones that sounds rather stylish & hip, FWIW. Unlike say Melvin, or Herbert, or Horace, or Elmer, or Mortimer, par exemple.
Pictured: Clifford
Thats rad, dog!
Meh, I'm on the edge with that one.
My grandfather (2nd generation polish immigrant) used to hate having to correct people on how to speak and pronounce our family name and decided to change it to something more “Americanized”. It took me a while to understand why until I spent 40 years having to correct people on the spelling and pronunciation of the Americanized version.
Then, two of my kids turned out to be genderqueer and they both chose new first names for themselves. It was them that I realized that choosing your own name is a powerful thing and you should be proud of forming your own identity. So, ignore everyone who questions choosing your own name. It is a good thing!
As for Cliff, I like it! It sounds good and it’s a name you hear a lot. Stick with it if you also like it!
USA perspective: I have a relative with that name (short for Clifford) who died in the ‘60s. Good name. Not common any more but ready for a fashionable comeback.
Sounds a bit old-timey. I refuse to believe that there are people younger than 60 years old with that name.
What's old is new again. I'm pretty sure I've heard some recent baby names that I would place more in the turn of the 20th century. Reusing older, creating totally new, or taking known names and spelling them oddly. They'll all have critics.
Names like Agatha and Edith and Florence are coming around again in kids, because they were popular around the 1920s and so the generation who had them are mostly now all dead.
Which means the names are once more free from expectations and 'available'.
If you name a child something that had a huge burst in popularity only sixty or seventy years ago however, the holders of the name are generally still alive and almost all old, so it still has a strong connotation of being an "old-person name"
So yeah. Old names become new and fashionable again if you wait. But the trick is to wait long enough.
Ouch. I mean, you're not wrong... But still.
It’s an old style name, short for Clifford or Clifton. Sounds direct and manly, not common today amongst young people. However, Cliff sounds cool! It is “classic,” like someone else said. It would be memorable to others for sure. :)
This guy
Him or the big red dog are where my mind goes.
Lol I was born in China and now a naturalized US Citizen and I still have the "Pinyin Name" as my legal name... I just never felt like any "English-language name" fits me... cuz they all gives off the "vibe" of being a ABC (American-Born Chinese) and that feels so "phony" to me.
I'd say just embrace your real name...
(I mean usually how it works is that: you just "Anglicanize" it a bit and drop the tones when people ask "how do you pronounce it")
It's a bit old fashioned and I'll admit, I do associate it with a big red dog from some children's books. That said, I like it and I think it's really cool when folks' English names are uncommon
I would choose something that at least has some resemblance to your real name. I've always found it awkward when somebody tells me that their name is, for example, "Liang but call me Peter". I'd rather call you Liang. Or Larry? Something related to your name somehow.
To me, it's not really any different than anyone else choosing a nickname and it would be kind of weird if my name was Sean and I decided that everybody should call me Vladimir.
But maybe Cliff does have some resemblance to yours, and I may have had more interaction with Chinese people than your average westerner has.
Older folks might think you're making a reference to Cliff Richard, a guy who is quite famous here, so expect that to come up every now and then.
Lots of people really don't like the guy, or think he's a bit cringe-worthy, but others regard him fondly.
Anyway, like yourself, Cliff isn't his real name, but most people know him by it.
Do with this knowledge what you will.
That is a great name. It is a classic “manly man” name.
Yeah same, I imagine it to be an old-time actor who played a lot of cowboys or soldiers. I'm not in England tho.
Agreed. Someone who wears knee high boots!
I like to use the real name of people, because that is more personal, after all, parents have given their children names for a reason. But perhaps that is simply a European thing, many Chinese people simply adopt another name, perhaps given names do not have so much meaning in China?
There is a very real bias against Chinese/SEA names in the west, whether it is intentional or not. Chinese students and expats know that they are far more likely to get eg, interviews and dates if they put a western name on their resume or dating profile.
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I agree with the sentiment, however, some names in some languages are practically unpronounceable for 99% of native [insert language] speakers, and hearing your name butchered over and over or seeing people struggle over it gets tiring quickly.
I have experienced this myself in English speaking countries. My name is not impossible to pronounce, but stumps half the people when they try to read it the first time. They will also mishear it and call me something similar. Usually if it's a colleague or someone I'll be talking to more than once I will let them know if they got it right. It's not difficult. But if I'm talking to a customer on the phone or ordering a coffee, I go with something easy.
I remember I had this classmate from Mongolia. She had one of those unpronounceable names. She would get very upset that nobody could say it right. There must have been some very specific sounds that only mongolian natives can pick up and reproduce in her name, because I've seen absolutely nobody, ever, from any background or nationality, be able to say it right. If you ask me, many did, and I could honestly not tell the difference between her pronunciation and that of most people. But she was outraged. It took her several months to get over it and accept nobody ever would get it right. She didn't pick a new name, but resigned herself to the butchered version of her name.
So yeah. More power to Cliff if that's a name they like.
Some people hate the names their parents gave them. So did I and I legally changed it as soon as I could.
Apologies for the comment I just edited out- I got attacked by Internet goblins. It was meant for another lemming on this post.
It sounds American and mid-20th-century. If that’s the vibe you’re going for, great.
I think it's a really good choice of name 👍
It's rare in England (from my experience) but we recognise all American names from TV and literature so, being slightly American, I think it comes across as a cool one while not seeming unusual.
It definitely seems unusual in the US. I've never met a Cliff and was actually myself kind of guessing that it might be more common in the UK.
I approve.
I used to work with a guy named Cliff. He was a really swell fellow. Sounds like a good name to me.
It sounds very butch 🤣
No, it's a cool name though - short and snappy ;)
I like it, but speaking perfectly honestly, I've never seen an Asian named Cliff
Is anyone saying it's a great name actually in the UK? Because in the UK people will think it's a rather odd and old-fashioned name (and not in a retro way).
I'm an American and that's what I think of it as well. And when I first hear it, I think of a physical cliff, not a person.
Its a fine name.
Right away I think of Cliff Clavin from Cheers.
My sister-in-law is Chinese. Her name is Lu Dong, but, here in the states, she is called Grace.
Although I think it’s a lovely name, I prefer to call her by her real name. So does she
I also, personally, dislike names that are also things. In English, a cliff is defined as a steep rock face, especially facing the sea. Personally, I would, at least, choose a different name than that one.
Before going by Grace, how often did she hear jokes about Lewd Dong?
I’ve known her for 25 years, and in that entire span of time, no one has lacked such Grace as to make such a comment
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No native anglophone, but hearing "Cliff" I immediately think "Cliff Stoll", so you are good with me! :-)
I'm over it.
Like the postman from cheers.
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