Name in Japanese M Marco

Marco in Japanese

マルコ
Katakana
マルコ
Hiragana
まるこ
Romaji (Hepburn)
Maruko

This is the established spelling used for Marco in Japanese dictionaries, books and media.

How Marco sounds in Japanese

Read it one katakana at a time:

Ma
Ru
Ko

Full reading: Maruko

Do more with Marco in Japanese

Why Marco is written in katakana

In Japanese, foreign names are written in katakana — the angular script reserved for words borrowed from other languages. So on a form, a name tag, a delivery slip or a news article in Japan, Marco appears as マルコ. This is the correct and respectful way a non-Japanese name is represented; it is not a kanji "translation". A Japanese reader sees マルコ and immediately reads it by its sound, Maruko.

Katakana is a syllabary, so English sounds are fitted to the nearest Japanese syllables and every consonant (except ん) is followed by a vowel. That is why Marco becomes マルコ rather than a letter-for-letter copy. More than one katakana spelling can be reasonable for the same name, which is why we flag whether a spelling is a long-established one or a natural default.