Kjell

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)

Attested across 5 languages in the etymology graph.

Other recorded senses●(measured from records)

Kjell is also recorded in 3 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

• In Swedish, Kjell är ett nordiskt namn, dels en sammandragen form av → Kettil, dels ursprungligen en smekform till namn på -kel, -kil, t.ex. → Eskil, → Torkel. Under 1940-talet var det ett av de vanligaste pojknamnen. En känd nutida namnbärare är skådespelaren Kjell Bergqvist (f. 1953). I den rikssvenska almanackan 8 juli och i den finlandssvenska 8 juni.

  as a name·Förnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon

• In German, männl. Vom., schwedische und norwe­

  as a name·DUDEN Lexikon der Vornamen

• Swedish: contracted form of KETTIL . Cognates: Norwegian: Kjetil. Danish: Kjeld, Keld .

  as a word

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)

• Kjell Aukrustb. 1920NONorwegian writer and illustrator (1920-2002)
• Kjell Askildsenb. 1929NONorwegian writer (1929–2021)
• Kjell Espmarkb. 1930SESwedish writer, literary historian, Member of the Swedish Academy (1930–2022)
• Kjell-Olof Feldtb. 1931SESwedish politician (1931–2025)
• Kjell Johanssonb. 1946SESwedish table tennis player (1946–2011)
• Kjell Magne Bondevikb. 1947NO33rd Prime Minister of Norway
• Kjell-Åke Anderssonb. 1949SESwedish film director and screenwriter
• Kjell Bergqvistb. 1953SESwedish actor
• Stefan Löfvenb. 1957SEnot in their usual nameSwedish politician, Prime Minister of Sweden between 2014–2021
• Kjell Westöb. 1961FISwedish-speaking writer and journalist from Finland

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)

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

Frequently asked questions

How do you pronounce Kjell?

A machine transcription gives /çɛlː/ (IPA) for Norwegian.

What does the name Kjell mean, and where does it come from?

a male given name popular in the mid-twentieth century Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).

In which country does Kjell have the most bearers?

In Sweden, the national register counted about 48 thousand people named Kjell, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled kjell.

Where is Kjell most common?

Kjell is densest in Sweden, where the national register counts about 1 in 214 people carrying it.

Is Kjell a male or female name?

Kjell 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 are other forms of the name Kjell?

In the etymology graph, Kjetil, Kjeld and Keld are forms of the same name in other languages.

How common is the name Kjell?

In Sweden, the national register counted 47,737 people named Kjell, about 1 in 214 residents.

How common is Kjell compared with other names?

In Sweden, Kjell is the 106th most common given name of 45,482 given names recorded there.