Google reveals 5.4 million results of "UK coronavirus variant" (archived url) as of 4 January 2021. Some government/media sources used it as a name, some used it colloquially. It is one of the top four terms in common (colloquial) usage, including U.K. Covid-19 variant, U.K. Coronavirus variant, U.K. variant and U.K. strain (click the above links for a list of source). The consensus on Request for Comment for UK- usage on the talk page of VOC 202012/01 is to include these terms prominently in the article's lead.