The Most Common Last Name In Every Country
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The last name is the part of a personal name that indicates a person’s family. All family members usually have identical surnames, or there may be differences based on the cultural rules.
Last names were first practiced in China in 2852 BCE on the census record, and this idea finally expanded to the rest of the world. Indeed, last names are relatively modern inventions in some parts of the world, where seldom just nobles were once granted family names, or different times there were just other forms to refer to people.
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By origin, all last names can be classified into 4 broad groups: given name (patronymics), occupational name, local name (toponymic), and personal characteristic or nickname.
But some surnames are more popular than others. Online lending firm NetCredit published a map of the most common surnames in every country.
The most common surnames worldwide
According to forebears.io globally, the most popular last names in the world are:
- Wang -107 million
- Li – 105 million
- Zhang – 98 million
- Chen – 75 million
- Liu – 74 million
- Devi – 71 million
- Yang – 48 million
- Huang – 37 million
- Singh – 36 million
- Wu – 35 million
It is not unexpected to see that the most popular last names are both Chinese or Indian since they are the two most populated nations on our planet.
In the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and many other English-speaking countries, Smith’s most popular last name. There are almost three million Smiths in the United States only, very few of whom are metalworkers.
Top 10 the most common last names in the United States
- Smith – 3,0 million
- Johnson – 2,3 million
- Williams – 1,9 million
- Brown – 1,i million
- Jones – 1,7 million
- Miller – 1,4 million
- Davis – 1,4 million
- Wilson – 1,0 million
- Anderson – 1,010,536
- Taylor – 925,876
Top 10 the most common last names in Canada
- Smith – 192 thousand
- Brown – 109 thousand
- Tremblay – 107 thousand
- Martin – 92 thousand
- Roy – 90 thousand
- Gagnon – 85 thousand
- Lee – 83 thousand
- Wilson 83 thousand
- Johnson – 79 thousand
- MacDonald – 79 thousand
Top 10 the most common last names in the United Kingdom
- Smith – 633 thousand
- Jones – 380 thousand
- Taylor – 293 thousand
- Brown – 284 thousand
- Williams – 272 thousand
- Wilson – 196 thousand
- Johnson – 191 thousand
- Davies – 176 thousand
- Patel – 167 thousand
- Robinson – 161 thousand
Top 10 the most common last names in Australia
- Smith – 212 thousand
- Jones – 111 thousand
- Williams – 106 thousand
- Brown – 105 thousand
- Wilson – 93 thousand
- Taylor – 89 thousand
- Anderson – 72 thousand
- Johnson – 67 thousand
- White – 64 thousand
- Thompson – 62 thousand
Some forms of Smith are the most common last names in the Western hemisphere. Whether it is Smith, Schmidt, Kuznetzov, Koval, Smythe Fabrizzio, or Fabricatore, it is really Smith.
Top 10 the most common last names in Germany
- Müller – 945 thousand
- Schmidt – 713 thousand
- Schneider – 438 thousand
- Fischer – 374 thousand
- Weber – 327 thousand
- Meyer – 324 thousand
- Wagner 300 thousand
- Becker – 280 thousand
- Schulz -279 thousand
- Hoffmann – 276 thousand
In India, how prevalent is Devi as a ‘surname’. Could that be used primarily by Hindu women who call themselves ‘Devi’ or goddess – (to refer t0 Parvati, Lakshmi, Saraswati). I notice in Fiji many women are named Devi in telephone directories.
Oman’s most common surname being al Balushi shows the large presence of Baluchis there.
Also notice the preponderance of Indian surnames in Fiji, Guyana and Mauritius.
Trinidad being interesting as Mohamed as a surname is rare amongst South Asians, which makes me think that it could be a Nation of Islam thingy. Which begs the question. How big is the Afro-Trinidadian Nation of Islam community? Or do Indian Muslims in Trinidad do have Mohamed as a surname.
Surinam has ‘Lin’ as the common surname. Assuming that is a Chinese name, and that Surinam is under 2% Chinese, what about other surnames? Surinam is at least 35% Hindustani, 25% plus Afro-Surinamese and high percentages of other communities like Javanese and Amerindians. Do they all have surnames not exceeding 5% of the population?
The prevalence of Ali in much of the Gulf Arab states is testimony to the large Shia Muslim population there.
Lots of Pakistanis too in the Gulf Arab states too, with the name ‘Khan’.
I notice that Spain’s most common surname is Garcia. It’s worth noting that’s actually a Basque name, not a Castilian one; it was originally spelled Gartzia.
I also notice that Ivanova is the most common surname in Russia. It makes sense that it’s the feminine form, since women outnumber men there.