Sheng

given name · Latin script

Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise

/ʃɛŋ/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated

Sheng is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country. Recorded meaning: To vanquish, conquer, overcome; surpass.

rarermore common
  • TWTaiwan≈1 in 1.1K(inferred from the name graph)
  • CNChina≈1 in 3.7K
  • MYMalaysia≈1 in 6.2K

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)

≈370,000 people, est.

Sources
272 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

≈1 in 1.1K (inferred from the name graph)

Taiwan, est.

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

To vanquish, conquer, overcome; surpass

Sources 1

  • Schuessler, ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese (2007)

Attested across 5 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Sheng 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 Sheng is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
CN China—≈370,000 est.≈1 in 3.7K—Sheng160
TW Taiwan—≈21,000 est.≈1 in 1.1K—Sheng131
MY Malaysia#323≈5,300 est.≈1 in 6.2K—Sheng78
ID Indonesia—≈3,900 est.≈1 in 68K—Sheng34
US United States—2,9941 in 111K2.6KSheng272
SG Singapore#520≈660 est.≈1 in 9.4K—Sheng73
HK Hong Kong#659≈400 est.≈1 in 18K—Sheng35

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; Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020. 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)

Sheng is also recorded as 3 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • English given name10 spellings in the group

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

    Languages: English, German, Dutch

    Also written Shëñg, Shêng, Šheng, Shéng, Shèng

  • a separate name5 spellings in the group

    Also written Shêng, Shēng, Shèng

  • Russian surname28 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Russia, Ukraine, China, Kazakhstan

    Languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian

    Also written Шен, Шень, Шэнь, Shen, Шэн

61 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)

0500100015002000Xu Sheng, b. 200Liu Sheng, b. 200Chen Sheng, b. 250Sun Sheng, b. 302Akira Yamada, b. 1908Akira Okada, b. 1913Akira Kimura, b. 1934Akira Sadakata, b. 1936Leiji Matsumoto, b. 1938Benny Chan, b. 1961
  • Xu Shengb. 200CNGeneral serving warlord Sun Quan (died c.225)
  • Liu Shengb. 200Prince of Zhongshan (died 113 BC)
  • Chen Shengb. 250CNQin Dynasty rebel
  • Sun Shengb. 302Jin dynasty historian (c.302–373)
  • Akira Yamadab. 1908JPnot in their usual nameJapanese legal scholar (1908–2003)
  • Akira Okadab. 1913JPnot in their usual nameJapanese mangaka
  • Akira Kimurab. 1934JPnot in their usual nameJapanese linguist
  • Akira Sadakatab. 1936JPnot in their usual nameJapanese teacher
  • Leiji Matsumotob. 1938JPnot in their usual nameJapanese manga artist (1938–2023)
  • Benny Chanb. 1961CNnot in their usual nameHong Kong filmmaker (1961–2020)

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)

FormalDear Colleague,
InformalHello,

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 43 sources across 22 countries.

Official registers attesting Sheng
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
US United StatesCensus Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex20201.9K#5,649
US United StatesCensus Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex20201.1K#5,649
US United StatesSSA — National Baby Names (1880–present)20165—
US United StatesSSA — National Baby Names (1880–present)20065—

Reference works 4

  • Dictionary of American Family Names
  • Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
  • 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 Sheng mean, and where does it come from?
To vanquish, conquer, overcome; surpass Recorded by Schuessler, ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese (2007).
How do you pronounce Sheng?
A machine transcription gives /ʃɛŋ/ (IPA) for English.
Is Sheng a male or female name?
Sheng 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.
In which country does Sheng have the most bearers?
Mondonomo estimates about 374 thousand people named Sheng in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled sheng.
How common is the name Sheng?
In the United States, the national register counted 2,994 people named Sheng in 2020, about 1 in 111 thousand residents.
How common is Sheng compared with other names?
In Malaysia, Sheng is the 323rd most common given name of 388,685 given names recorded there.

What do you want to know about Sheng?

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Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/sheng

The 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, “Sheng” — the 323rd most common given name in Malaysia. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Sheng parses inside a full name →