Dan
given name · Latin script
Meaning: Derived from the Hebrew root 'din' (דִּין), meaning 'to judge' or 'judgment'
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/dæn/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Dan is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country.
- SESweden1 in 455(measured from records)
- CACanada≈1 in 798
- DKDenmark1 in 948
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)
- #519 (measured from records)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 629 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 253 (inferred from the name graph)
≈1,300,000 people, est.
of 15M given names
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Romania, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
One other spelling is counted as the same name:
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)
Derived from the Hebrew root 'din' (דִּין), meaning 'to judge' or 'judgment'. The name is explained in Genesis 30:6 when Rachel declares, 'God has judged me'.
Sources 1
- Biblical Names Compiled Database
Attested across 21 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Dan 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 | — | ≈1,300,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.1K | — | Dan | 149 |
| US United States | #225 | 127,523 | 1 in 2.6K | 124K | Dan | 629 |
| RO Romania | #824 | ≈84,000 est. | ≈1 in 253 | — | Dan | 127 |
| NG Nigeria | #594 | ≈81,000 est. | ≈1 in 2.6K | — | Dan | 84 |
| GB United Kingdom | #274 | ≈53,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.2K | — | Dan | 347 |
| CA Canada | #136 | ≈47,000 est. | ≈1 in 798 | 7 | Dan | 338 |
| SE Sweden | #202 | 22,427 | 1 in 455 | 22K | Dan | 126 |
| DK Denmark | #107 | 6,189 | 1 in 948 | 6.2K | Dan | 172 |
| MD Moldova | — | 5,730 | 1 in 587 | 5.7K | — | 52 |
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; Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender; Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts); e-services.md — living population register. 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)
Dan 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.
A male name of Hebrew origin meaning 'judgment' or 'he judged'. It is often used as a standalone name or as a diminutive for Daniel.
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
Dan represents judgment and vindication in the genesis narrative. However, in prophetic and apocalyptic literature, the Tribe of Dan is often associated with apostasy; notably, it is the only tribe omitted from the sealing of the 144,000 in the Book of Revelation (7:4-8).
as a nameBiblical Names Compiled Database
In German, from Slavic *dan 'given'; also from short forms of Daniel and related names
as a nameDeutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung
In modern use this is taken as a short form of Daniel, but it is also an independent biblical name, meaning ‘he judged’ in Hebrew, borne by one of Jacob’s twelve sons (Genesis 30:6). Pet form: Danny.
as a nameA concise dictionary of first names
In English, A title of honour or respect similar to "master" or "Sir", used of historical and legendary figures of the past.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
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)
- Dan Duryeab. 1907USAmerican actor (1907–1968)
- Dan Hedayab. 1940USAmerican actor (born 1940)
- Dan O'Bannonb. 1946USAmerican film director, screenwriter, actor (1946-2009)
- Dan Quayleb. 1947USvice president of the United States from 1989 to 1993
- Dan Laustsenb. 1954DKDanish cinematographer
- Dan Gilroyb. 1959USAmerican screenwriter
- Dan Marinob. 1961USAmerican football player, quarterback, Pro Football Hall of Fame member
- Dan Foglerb. 1976USAmerican actor, musician and filmmaker
- Dan Balanb. 1979MDMoldovan singer
- Lin Danb. 1983CNChinese badminton player
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 129 sources across 60 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 124K | #442 |
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 22K | #190 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2020 | 12K | — |
| DK Denmark | Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts) | — | 6.2K | #107 |
| MD Moldova | e-services.md — living population register | — | 5.7K | #159 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 3.7K | #442 |
| CA Canada | Statistics Canada — First names at birth by sex at birth (Table 17-10-0147-01) | 2024 | 21 | — |
| CA Canada | Statistics Canada — First names at birth by sex at birth (Table 17-10-0147-01) | 1993 | 8 | — |
| CA Canada | Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender | 2024 | 7 | #607 |
Reference works 11
- 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
- Hoffman, Polish Surnames: Origins and Meanings (2nd ed., 2012)
- jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)
- Søndergaard, Georg, Danske efternavne (Lademann 1984/1991)
- 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 Dan a male or female name?
- Dan 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.
- Where does the name Dan come from?
- Derived from the Hebrew root 'din' (דִּין), meaning 'to judge' or 'judgment'. The name is explained in Genesis 30:6 when Rachel declares, 'God has judged me'. Recorded by Biblical Names Compiled Database.
- What are other forms of the name Dan?
- In the etymology graph, Danny, Dany and Dannie are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Daniel.
- What does the name Dan mean?
- Recorded meaning: Derived from the Hebrew root 'din' (דִּין), meaning 'to judge' or 'judgment'.
- How common is the name Dan?
- In the United States, the national register counted 127,523 people named Dan in 2020, about 1 in 2.6 thousand residents.
- How common is Dan compared with other names?
- In Denmark, Dan is the 107th most common given name of 23,174 given names recorded there.
- How do you pronounce Dan?
- A machine transcription gives /dæn/ (IPA) for English.
- In which country does Dan have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 1.3 million people named Dan in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled dan.
What do you want to know about Dan?
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/danThe 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, “Dan” — the 107th most common given name in Denmark. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.