Patronymic form of Matthew, from Hebrew Mattityahu meaning 'gift of God.'
Matthews is an English patronymic surname meaning "son of Matthew," and Matthew itself descends from the Hebrew Mattityahu — "gift of Yahweh" or "gift of God." The name entered Western usage primarily through the New Testament, where Matthew the tax collector became one of the Twelve Apostles and the attributed author of the first Gospel, making the name both sacred and widely distributed across the Christian world from the early centuries CE onward.
As a first name, Matthews carries the distinguished gravity of the surname tradition — the same impulse that made Madison, Harrison, and Fletcher fashionable — while connecting to one of the most ancient name lineages in Western culture. In American cultural life, the name is most associated with Dave Matthews, the South African-born musician whose Dave Matthews Band became one of the defining live-music phenomena of the 1990s and 2000s, introducing a generation to jazz-inflected rock and giving the name a creative, free-spirited register. Used as a given name, Matthews strikes a balance between formality and familiarity: it has the weight of something established without feeling stiff or dated.
It is a name that tends to be given deliberately — chosen by parents who want their child's name to carry a sense of lineage and narrative, something earned and layered. In an era when biblical given names feel newly fresh and surname-names project confident individuality, Matthews merges both impulses into a single word, making it quietly distinctive without demanding attention.