Islas

surname · Latin script

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

Islas is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country. Recorded meaning: habitational name from a place called Islas (Malaga, Ciudad Real), or a topographic name meaning ‘from the islands’ (for example the Canaries), from the plural of isla ‘island’, from Latin insula.

rarermore common
  • UYUruguay1 in 3K(measured from records)
  • ARArgentina1 in 15K
  • CLChile≈1 in 24K

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.

United States (measured from records)

9,200 people, 2010

Sources
256 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

1 in 3.0K (inferred from the name graph)

Uruguay

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

habitational name from a place called Islas (Malaga, Ciudad Real), or a topographic name meaning ‘from the islands’ (for example the Canaries), from the plural of isla ‘island’, from Latin insula.

Sources 1

  • Dictionary of American Family Names

Attested across 2 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Islas 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 Islas is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
US United States—9,2001 in 36K9.2KIslas256
CN China—≈8,900 est.≈1 in 157K—Islas3
AR Argentina—3,0401 in 15K3KIslas62
UY Uruguay#5071,1251 in 3K1.1KIslas32
CL Chile—≈760 est.≈1 in 24K—Islas41
SV El Salvador#919≈160 est.≈1 in 41K—Islas3
MX Mexico#196——1.6KIslas203

9,200 people counted by Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010, 2010. 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: RENAPO — name frequencies (eduardofv dataset); Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010; RENAPER — Apellidos (person counts, national); INE Uruguay — Apellidos más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public). 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)

Islas is also recorded as 5 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • English surname8 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Australia

    Languages: English, German, Dutch

    Also written Isläš, I͓̽s͓̽l͓̽a͓̽s͓̽, Ïsläs

  • Lao surname4 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Laos, United States

    Languages: Lao, Thai

    Also written Isläs, Ïsläs

  • Hindi surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, India, Spain

    Languages: Hindi, Urdu

  • Arabic surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Spain

    Also written Işlaş, Íslas

  • Polish surname6 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Poland, Russia, Ukraine

    Languages: Polish, Russian, Ukrainian

    Also written Ислас

47 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)

19201940196019802000Arturo Islas, b. 1938Blanca Guerra, b. 1953María Emilia Islas Gatti, b. 1953Luis Islas, b. 1965Ricardo Islas, b. 1969Jonathan Islas, b. 1979Daniel Islas, b. 1979Alfonso Luna, b. 1990Omar Islas, b. 1996

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 24 sources across 12 countries.

Reference works 3

  • Dictionary of American Family Names
  • Wikipedia surname tokens
  • Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)

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

What does the name Islas mean, and where does it come from?
habitational name from a place called Islas (Malaga, Ciudad Real), or a topographic name meaning ‘from the islands’ (for example the Canaries), from the plural of isla ‘island’, from Latin insula. Recorded by Dictionary of American Family Names.
In which country does Islas have the most bearers?
In the United States, the national register counted about 9.2 thousand people named Islas, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled islas.
Where is Islas most common?
Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Islas is densest in Uruguay — about 1 in 3.0 thousand people — even though United States holds more of our records for it.
How common is the name Islas?
In the United States, the national register counted 9,200 people named Islas in 2010, about 1 in 36 thousand residents.
How common is Islas compared with other names?
In Mexico, Islas is the 196th most common surname of 206,803 surnames recorded there.

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Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/islas

The same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. Rate-limited for casual use; a free API key gives 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, “Islas” — the 196th most common surname in Mexico. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Islas parses inside a full name →