Ballay

surname · Latin script

Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published

Ballay is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in France than in any other country.

rarermore common
  • FRFrance≈1 in 74K(inferred from the name graph)
  • SLSierra Leone≈1 in 84K
  • GAGabon≈1 in 108K

carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.

France (inferred from the name graph)

≈910 people, est.

Sources
165 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

≈1 in 74K (inferred from the name graph)

France, est.

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Meaning & origin

No verified etymology recorded for this name yet — the entries below are drawn from usage statistics and the name graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Ballay counted together with the spellings and other-language forms grouped with it. Where a register counted another spelling, the row names it.

Sorted by bearers: national registers' counts, and Mondonomo's estimates (≈, est.) where no register counts.

Where Ballay is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
FR France≈910 est.≈1 in 74K93Ballay165
US United States2921 in 1.1M293Ballay39
CD Congo - Kinshasa≈200 est.≈1 in 507K—Ballay4
AR Argentina1661 in 274K166——
PH Philippines≈110 est.≈1 in 986K—Ballay1
SL Sierra Leone≈79 est.≈1 in 84K1——
CH Switzerland321 in 263K32Ballay4
GA Gabon≈21 est.≈1 in 108K1—2

Exact figures are national registers' own counts, while figures marked ≈ and est. are Mondonomo’s estimates, counted from our sources and calibrated against those registers; hover one for how far to trust it in that country. A dash means neither exists.

Registers cited: INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000); Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010; Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020; RENAPER — Apellidos (person counts, national); BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames); NEC/ECSL — 2018 Local Council, Chairperson and Mayor nominated candidates; Ministere de l'Interieur — 2025 candidate lists (local + legislative). Figures without a register are Mondonomo estimates; see Methodology.

Country figures for a list of names, at full precision, are available under licence rather than by scraping this table (how that works).

Other names spelled this way(inferred from the name graph)

Ballay is also recorded as 2 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • English surname6 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Germany, Philippines, United Kingdom

    Languages: English, German

    Also written Ballaÿ, Ballaý

  • Polish name2 spellings in the group

    Also written Ballaý

38 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Notable people with this name(measured from records)

18001850190019502000Noël Ballay, b. 1847Hubert Ballay, b. 1928Alain Ballay, b. 1954Christine Ballay, b. 1963Verona Ballay, b. 1982

The ten people covered by the most Wikipedia language editions — a proxy for cross-cultural notability, which favours historical and Western figures over equally prominent contemporary ones — shown by birth year. Source: Wikidata (CC0).

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 20 sources across 10 countries.

Official registers attesting Ballay
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
SL Sierra LeoneNEC/ECSL — 2012 Councillor and Ordinary-MP/PCMP results tables20121#30
SL Sierra LeoneNEC/ECSL — 2012 parliamentary and Local Council nominated candidates20121#22
SL Sierra LeoneNEC/ECSL — 2018 Local Council, Chairperson and Mayor nominated candidates20181#45

Reference works 4

These works list the name; their figures are licensed and are not reproduced here.

Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.

Frequently asked questions

In which country does Ballay have the most bearers?
Mondonomo estimates about 914 people named Ballay in France, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled ballay.
How common is the name Ballay?
In the United States, the national register counted 292 people named Ballay in 2010, about 1 in 1.1 million residents.

What do you want to know about Ballay?

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Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/ballay

The same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. It takes a free API key (1,000 requests a day), and bulk access is licensed separately.

About this data

measured from records inferred from the name graph machine-generated

These figures come from the data snapshot of and will change as it is rebuilt.

Statistics are aggregated from the Mondonomo name corpus; related names and etymology are inferred from the name graph; pronunciation and any machine-marked transliterations are model-generated. Read how the numbers are made, including their known failure modes, and where the data comes from.

Reference works we consult — surname dictionaries, official name registers, Wikidata and Wiktionary — are named directly, beside the claims they support. The per-country source counts also include datasets of person records: we publish how many there are and their authority tier, but not their names.

Cite this page Mondonomo, “Ballay”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Ballay parses inside a full name →