Scandinavian male names draw chiefly from Old Norse and later Danish, Norwegian, and Swedish usage, with Icelandic retaining conservative forms. A clear masculine marker is the Old Norse/Icelandic nominative -r in given names and the Icelandic patronymic -son for men; in mainland Scandinavia, fixed surnames replaced patronymics. Male given names often use elements like Ás/As (from “Æsir,” gods), Arn/Arn- (“eagle”), and Björn/Bjarn (“bear”), seen in forms such as Asger, Ásgrim, Arnthor, Anbjorn, and Arne.

Modern patterns favor short, simple forms and established variants: Anders, Ari, Axel, Anker, Aske, Arild, and Ask are typical across the region, while Iceland keeps more archaic spellings.