Leh
surname · Latin script
Meaning: from Genet. lewes, MHG 'hill'; also from lewer, Schwab (Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung)
(measured from records)Officially recorded in 10 countries · latest register: DZS, 2021
/leɪ/(recorded in a dictionary) English · from Wiktionary
Leh is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Malaysia than in any other country.
- MYMalaysia≈1 in 24K(inferred from the name graph)
- HRCroatia1 in 282K
- NONorway1 in 342K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). Countries with no figure are shown too: flat where a national register lists the name without counting it, hatched where only our records hold it. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- Malaysia (inferred from the name graph)
- Record sources
- 175 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 24K (inferred from the name graph)
≈1,500 people, est.
corpus datasets behind its best-documented spelling
strongest: highest-authority source
Malaysia, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
How to pronounce Leh
- English:/leɪ/(recorded in a dictionary) from Wiktionary
- Malay:/ləh/(machine-generated) model-generated
Readings marked model-generated were transcribed by a model; the others are quoted from the dictionary named.
Meaning & origin
(measured from records)- Middle Englishgenet(inferred from the name graph)via Genet
- Anglo-Normangenette(inferred from the name graph)via Genet
Steps marked ◐ come from the entry for the form named above them, not from this name's own sources.
from Genet. lewes, MHG 'hill'; also from lewer, Schwab. laih
Cited for this meaning 1
- Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung
Attested across 2 languages in the etymology graph.
Where the surname Leh is found
(measured from records)Leh 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| MY Malaysia | ≈1,500 est. | ≈1 in 24K | — | Leh | 36 |
| US United States | 601 | 1 in 553K | 601 | Leh | 175 |
| PH Philippines | ≈230 est. | ≈1 in 513K | — | Leh | 26 |
| GB United Kingdom | ≈150 est. | ≈1 in 458K | — | Leh | 30 |
| FR France | ≈120 est. | ≈1 in 595K | 5 | — | 1 |
| SG Singapore | ≈48 est. | ≈1 in 127K | — | Leh | 24 |
| IE Ireland | ≈29 est. | ≈1 in 185K | — | Leh | 2 |
| NO Norway | 16 | 1 in 342K | 16 | — | 2 |
| HR Croatia | 15 | 1 in 282K | 16 | — | — |
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 — Surname Frequency 2010; DZS — Imena i prezimena (per-token lookup form); DZS — Učestalost prezimena (Popis 2021); SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, living population); INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000). 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)Leh 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.
perhaps an altered spelling of Loh, a habitational name from any of numerous places named Loh or Lohe. This name is found chiefly in PA.
as a nameDictionary of American Family Names
In Slovenian, genitive dual/plural of leha
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In Czech, lying position
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In quc, corn tortilla
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In Albanian, to bark, yap
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)- Michael Lehb. 1943DEGerman engineer and mineralogist (1943-)
- Dennis Lehb. 1946USAmerican politician
- Almut Lehb. 1961DEGerman historian
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)Evidence
(measured from records)16 registers and reference works attest this spelling, across 10 countries.
Register rows as of the 2026-10-09 data build.
Frequently asked questions
- Where does the name Leh come from?
- from Genet. lewes, MHG 'hill'; also from lewer, Schwab. laih Recorded by Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung.
- How do you pronounce Leh?
- It depends on the language: in English /leɪ/ (Wiktionary); in Malay /ləh/. Transcriptions are machine-generated except where a dictionary is named.
- What does the name Leh mean?
- Recorded meaning: from Genet. lewes, MHG 'hill'; also from lewer, Schwab.
- Which countries have the most people with the surname Leh?
- Mondonomo estimates about 1.5 thousand people named Leh in Malaysia, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled leh. After it come United States, Philippines, United Kingdom and France; the country table on this page ranks them.
- How common is the name Leh?
- In the United States, the national register counted 601 people named Leh in 2010, about 1 in 553 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Leh?
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/lehThe 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, “Leh”. Data snapshot 2026-10-13.