Carlsen

surname · Latin script

Meaning: a surname originating as a patronymic

Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published

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

Carlsen is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Denmark than in any other country, where it is the 80th most common surname.

rarermore common
  • DKDenmark1 in 869(measured from records)
  • NONorway1 in 1K
  • USUnited States1 in 77K

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.

Denmark (measured from records)

6,755 people

Sources
316 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

1 in 869 (inferred from the name graph)

Denmark

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

a surname originating as a patronymic

Sources 1

  • kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

Attested across 3 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Carlsen 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 Carlsen is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
DK Denmark#806,7551 in 8696.8KCarlsen138
NO Norway#1035,3601 in 1K5.4KCarlsen87
US United States—4,3431 in 77K4.3KCarlsen316
CD Congo - Kinshasa—≈3,400 est.≈1 in 30K—Carlsen1
EG Egypt—≈780 est.≈1 in 134K—Carlsen7
SE Sweden—3111 in 33K311Carlsen29
IS Iceland—≈12 est.≈1 in 29KlistedCarlsen5

6,755 people counted by Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts). 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; Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts); SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, living population); Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population). 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)

Carlsen is also recorded as 5 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • a separate name2 spellings in the group

    Also written Carlsén

  • a separate surname2 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Norway, United Kingdom, Sweden

    Also written Carlsén

  • Norwegian surname34 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Norway, Denmark, United States, Sweden

    Languages: Norwegian, Danish, Spanish

    Also written Karlsen, คาร์ลเซ่น, Khansen, คาร์ลเซน, คาร์ลเซ็น

  • Finnish surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Norway, United States

    Also written Carlsén

  • Polish surname2 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Poland, Norway, United Kingdom

    Also written Carlsén

49 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.

Other recorded senses(measured from records)

Carlsen is also recorded in 2 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

  • In German, Patronymischer Familienname zu Rufname Karl mit -sen; auch skandinavisch möglich, Bearer count: 226.

    as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 6: Familiennamen aus Rufnamen

  • In German, patronymisch zu Rufname Karl, mit -sen; 226 Belege

    as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 6: Familiennamen aus Rufnamen

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)

18001850190019502000Elling Carlsen, b. 1819Emil Carlsen, b. 1848Lalla Carlsen, b. 1889Carsten Carlsen, b. 1892Kurt Carlsen, b. 1914Henning Carlsen, b. 1927Agnete Carlsen, b. 1971Kenneth Carlsen, b. 1973Nadim Carlsen, b. 1984Magnus Carlsen, b. 1990

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 Carlsen,
InformalHello,

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 29 sources across 17 countries.

Reference works 5

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 Carlsen mean, and where does it come from?
a surname originating as a patronymic Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
How do you pronounce Carlsen?
A machine transcription gives /ˈkɑɹɫsən/ (IPA) for English.
In which country does Carlsen have the most bearers?
In Denmark, the national register counted about 6.8 thousand people named Carlsen, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled carlsen.
Where is Carlsen most common?
Carlsen is densest in Denmark, where the national register counts about 1 in 869 people carrying it.
How common is the name Carlsen?
In Denmark, the national register counted 6,755 people named Carlsen, about 1 in 869 residents.
How common is Carlsen compared with other names?
In Denmark, Carlsen is the 80th most common surname of 88,366 surnames recorded there.

What do you want to know about Carlsen?

Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.

Please leave out anyone's personal details (see Privacy).

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

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, “Carlsen” — the 80th most common surname in Denmark. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Carlsen parses inside a full name →