James
given name · Latin script
Meaning: from the medieval personal name James, from Latin Iacomus via Old French; borne by many notable people
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/dʒemz/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
James is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country. In Singapore it is the most common given name.
- KPNorth Korea≈1 in 64(inferred from the name graph)
- IEIreland≈1 in 65
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 70
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.
- China (inferred from the name graph)
- #14 (measured from records)
- 3 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 715 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 64 (inferred from the name graph)
≈19,000,000 people, est.
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
North Korea, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
from the medieval personal name James, from Latin Iacomus via Old French; borne by many notable people.
Sources 1
- Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
Attested across 12 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
James 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.
| Country | Most common spelling | Sources | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CN China | — | ≈19,000,000 est. | ≈1 in 73 | — | James | 154 |
| US United States | #4 | 2,996,421 | 1 in 111 | 3M | James | 715 |
| GB United Kingdom | #4 | ≈940,000 est. | ≈1 in 70 | 1.3K | James | 490 |
| NG Nigeria | #34 | ≈620,000 est. | ≈1 in 343 | — | James | 162 |
| IT Italy | #14 | ≈420,000 est. | ≈1 in 150 | listed | James | 168 |
| KP North Korea | #2 | ≈400,000 est. | ≈1 in 64 | — | James | 19 |
| IE Ireland | #4 | ≈80,000 est. | ≈1 in 65 | — | James | 223 |
| SG Singapore | #1 | ≈67,000 est. | ≈1 in 92 | — | James | 188 |
| NZ New Zealand | #2 | ≈67,000 est. | ≈1 in 73 | — | James | 267 |
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: Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; ONS — Baby names England and Wales (2024). 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 recorded senses(measured from records)
James is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In English, From the personal name James, from Late Latin Jacomus/Jacmus, an alteration of Latin Jacobus.
as a nameEncyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
James is a timeless and classic name of Hebrew origin, meaning "supplanter." Borne by two of Jesus's apostles and the revered King James of Bible fame, the name carries a rich history of faith, royalty, and leadership. It has remained a consistently popular choice for centuries, suggesting strength, reliability, and integrity.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name James is the English derivation of the Latin 'Iacomus', which comes from the Greek 'Ἰάκωβος' (Iákōbos), a Hellenized form of the Hebrew name 'יַעֲקֹב' (Ya'aqov) or Jacob. The traditional meaning of Jacob is "supplanter" or "he who grasps the heel," based on the biblical account of Jacob's birth in Genesis 25:26.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name James is a later form of the Latin Iacomus, derived from the Greek Iakōbos, which in turn comes from the Hebrew name Ya'aqov (Jacob). The traditional meaning of Ya'aqov is "supplanter" or "heel-catcher," derived from the biblical account of Jacob holding his twin brother Esau's heel at birth.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
The name James comes from the Hebrew name Jacob and means 'supplanter.' It has a long and noble history, being the name of two of Jesus's apostles and numerous kings. It suggests a person who is reliable, traditional, and a natural leader.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
Ordered by how much of this spelling's record each language holds, so a sense from a language the name is barely used in sits last rather than first.
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- James II of Englandb. 1633GBKing of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 1685 to 1688 (1633–1701)
- James Madisonb. 1751USPresident of the United States from 1809 to 1817 (1751–1836)
- James Monroeb. 1758USpresident of the United States from 1817 to 1825 (1758–1831)
- James Buchananb. 1791USpresident of the United States from 1857 to 1861
- James K. Polkb. 1795USPresident of the United States from 1845 to 1849 (1795–1849)
- James Stewartb. 1908USAmerican actor and military officer (1908–1997)
- Gordon Brownb. 1951GBnot in their usual namePrime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2007 to 2010
- James Hornerb. 1953USAmerican film composer and conductor (1953-2015)
- James Bluntb. 1974GBEnglish singer-songwriter (born 1974)
- James Wanb. 1977MYMalaysian-Australian filmmaker (born 1977)
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).
How to address them(machine-generated)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 214 sources across 99 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 3M | #3 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2025 | 12K | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 3.9K | #3 |
| GB United Kingdom | ONS — Baby names England and Wales (2024) | 2024 | 1.3K | #40 |
Reference works 10
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Nişanyan Adlar (Turkish given-name national-registry frequency)
- Wikipedia given-name tokens
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- Rymut, Słownik nazwisk współcześnie w Polsce używanych (10 vols, IJP PAN, Kraków 1992–1994) — every Polish surname in the PESEL register at the end of 1990, with bearer counts nationally and per voivodeship1990
- jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)
- Ethiopian name tokens (GitHub lehagere/ethiopian-names, 40/60 condominium list)
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
- Is James a male or female name?
- James is a male name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- What does the name James mean, and where does it come from?
- from the medieval personal name James, from Latin Iacomus via Old French; borne by many notable people. Recorded by Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history].
- What are other forms of the name James?
- In the etymology graph, Jaime, Jacob and Jacques are forms of the same name in other languages; Jay, Jamie and Jim are recorded short or pet forms.
- In which country does James have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 19 million people named James in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled james.
- How common is the name James?
- In the United States, the national register counted 2,996,421 people named James in 2020, about 1 in 111 residents.
- How common is James compared with other names?
- In Singapore, James is the most common given name of 52,448 given names recorded there.
- How do you pronounce James?
- A machine transcription gives /dʒemz/ (IPA) for English.
What do you want to know about James?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/jamesThe 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), which returns what this page shows everyone; the full country table, every register citation and the year-by-year series come with a licensed key, as does bulk access.
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, “James” — the most common given name in Singapore. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.