Zhen

given name · Latin script

Used for both men and women· registers list it under both sexes; no split published

(measured from records)Officially recorded in 24 countries · latest register: Þjóðskrá Íslands, 2026

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

Zhen is a given name used for both men and women, written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country.

rarermore common
  • USUnited States1 in 82K(measured from records)
  • SESweden1 in 76K
  • NLNetherlands1 in 171K

carrying the name, as counted by each country's national register. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.

United States (measured from records)

4,065 people, 2020

Record sources
238 (measured from records)

corpus datasets behind its best-documented spelling

strongest: highest-authority source

1 in 76K (inferred from the name graph)

Sweden

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Meaning & origin

(measured from records)
recorded in Korean

以 地 名 为 氏 , 见 《五 方 元 音 》(444) 。 同 前 氏 ， 见 《 直 音 篇 》(86) 。 rap kudi

Cited for this meaning 3

  • A concise dictionary of first names
  • Chinese Surnames Encyclopedia (Section 2)
  • Schuessler, ABC Etymological Dictionary of Old Chinese (2007)

Attested across 4 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world

(measured from records)

Zhen 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 Zhen is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
US United States—4,0651 in 82K5.2KZhen238
ES Spain—1361 in 368K136—12
SE Sweden—1341 in 76K134—6
NL Netherlands—1011 in 171K53Zhen11
BR Brazil—791 in 2.7M79—2
DK Denmark—241 in 245K15——
IS Iceland—11 in 351K1——
SG Singapore#713———Zhen75

4,065 people counted by Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex, 2020. 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; Meertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018); INE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos); Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); IBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror); Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts); Þjóðskrá Íslands — Name frequencies (NafnTíðni, registry). 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)

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

  • Spanish given name7 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, France, China, Brazil

    Languages: Spanish, French, Portuguese

    Also written Zhēn, Zhén

  • a separate name3 spellings in the group

    Also written Zhēn, Zhén

  • English surname47 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Netherlands, United States, Ukraine, Russia

    Languages: English, Russian, Dutch

    Also written Zon, Жен, Зонь, Зон, Zoen

60 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)
100012001400160018002000Emperor Renzong of Song, b. 1010Huang Xing, b. 1874Wang Zhen, b. 1908Zhang Zhen, b. 1914Ni Zhen, b. 1938Chen Chen, b. 1948Kumāra, b. 1972Chang Chen, b. 1976Xu Zhen, b. 1977Wang Zhen, b. 1991
  • Emperor Renzong of Songb. 1010CNnot in their usual nameChinese emperor from 1022 to 1063
  • Huang Xingb. 1874CNnot in their usual nameChinese revolutionary (1874-1916)
  • Wang Zhenb. 1908CNChinese military officer and politician (1908-1993)
  • Zhang Zhenb. 1914CNformer Vice Chairman of the Central Military Commission of China (1914-2015)
  • Ni Zhenb. 1938CNChinese screenwriter and professor (1938-2022)
  • Chen Chenb. 1948TWnot in their usual nameTaiwanese actress
  • Kumārab. 1972MYnot in their usual nameMalaysian Buddhist monk
  • Chang Chenb. 1976TWnot in their usual nameTaiwanese actor
  • Xu Zhenb. 1977CNChinese artist (born 1977)
  • Wang Zhenb. 1991CNChinese racewalker

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)

52 registers and reference works attest this spelling, across 24 countries.

Official registers attesting Zhen
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
US United StatesCensus Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex20202.3K#4,538
US United StatesCensus Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex20201.8K#4,538
ES SpainINE — Padrón per-token widgets (current living counts, given + apellidos)—136#12,345
SE SwedenSkatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population)—134#7,000
ES SpainINE — Nombres más frecuentes (Padrón Municipal)—121#6,024
ES SpainINE — Nombres más frecuentes (Padrón Municipal)—116#6,555
BR BrazilIBGE — names by decade (Kaggle mirror)202279—
BR BrazilIBGE — Nomes (census name API)—54#46,723
NL NetherlandsMeertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018)—53#6,449
NL NetherlandsMeertens NVB — Nederlandse Voornamenbank (all-time BRP bearer counts, 2018)—48#8,647
BR BrazilIBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname)—42#48,671
BR BrazilIBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname)—37#48,671

Reference works 4

  • Dictionary of American Family Names
  • Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
  • Wikipedia given-name 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

Is Zhen a male or female name?
Zhen is used for both men and women. National registers that list it by sex count it under both: United States (Census Bureau, 2020), Spain (INE), Finland (DVV) and Netherlands (Meertens NVB). We don't publish a percentage split.
How do you pronounce Zhen?
A machine transcription gives /dʒən/ (IPA) for Chinese.
In which country does Zhen have the most bearers?
In the United States, the national register counted about 4.1 thousand people named Zhen, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled zhen.
Where is Zhen most common?
Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Zhen is densest in Sweden — about 1 in 76 thousand people — even though United States holds more of our records for it.
How common is the name Zhen?
In the United States, the national register counted 4,065 people named Zhen in 2020, about 1 in 82 thousand residents.
How common is Zhen compared with other names?
In Singapore, Zhen is the 713th most common given name of 52,448 given names recorded there.

What do you want to know about Zhen?

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

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, “Zhen” — the 713th most common given name in Singapore. Data snapshot 2026-10-13.

See how Zhen parses inside a full name →