Gannon
surname · Latin script
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
Gannon is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country. Recorded meaning: From Irish Gaelic Mag Fhionndin, 'son of Fionndin', a name meaning 'little white or fair person'.
- IEIreland≈1 in 3.4K(inferred from the name graph)
- AUAustralia≈1 in 12K
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 13K
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.
- United States (measured from records)
- Sources
- 444 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 3.4K (inferred from the name graph)
14,981 people, 2010
Highest-authority source
Ireland, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
From Irish Gaelic Mag Fhionndin, 'son of Fionndin', a name meaning 'little white or fair person'.
Sources 1
- Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Gannon 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 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | — | 14,981 | 1 in 22K | 15K | Gannon | 444 |
| GB United Kingdom | — | ≈5,200 est. | ≈1 in 13K | listed | Gannon | 219 |
| EG Egypt | — | ≈2,400 est. | ≈1 in 43K | — | Gannon | 5 |
| AU Australia | — | ≈2,100 est. | ≈1 in 12K | 1 | Gannon | 152 |
| CA Canada | — | ≈1,800 est. | ≈1 in 21K | 1 | Gannon | 128 |
| IE Ireland | #275 | ≈1,500 est. | ≈1 in 3.4K | — | Gannon | 120 |
| NZ New Zealand | — | ≈220 est. | ≈1 in 22K | — | Gannon | 29 |
14,981 people counted by Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010, 2010. 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; the hanks-dictionary-surnames-1988 register; SA BDM — Popular baby names South Australia (1944–present); Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender. 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)
Gannon 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.
reduced Anglicized form of Gaelic Mag Fhionnain, a patronymic from the personal name Fionndn. This name, from a diminutive of fionn ‘white’, ‘fair’, was borne by several early Irish saints.
as a nameDictionary of American Family Names
patr. from the given name Fionndn. This name, from a dim. of fionn white, fair, was borne by several early Ir. saints.
as a nameThe Oxford Names Companion - The definitive guide to Surnames, First Names, and Place Names of the British Isles
In English, University, PA
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
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)
- Kim Gannonb. 1900USAmerican songwriter
- Michael Gannonb. 1927USAmerican historian
- Lucy Gannonb. 1948GBBritish television producer and writer
- Sharon Gannonb. 1951USAmerican yoga teacher
- Terry Gannonb. 1963USAmerican basketball player and sportscaster
- Rich Gannonb. 1965USAmerican football player
- Craig Gannonb. 1966GBEnglish musician
- John Gannonb. 1966GBBritish footballer (born 1966)
- Jim Gannonb. 1968GBfootballer; football manager (born 1968)
- Marylin Starb. 1969CAnot in their usual nameCanadian pornographic film actress
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).
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 30 sources across 17 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010 | 2010 | 15K | #2,418 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2000 | 2000 | 15K | #2,286 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020 | 2020 | 14K | #2,451 |
| GB United Kingdom | A Dictionary of Surnames (Hanks & Hodges, 1988) | — | — | — |
| US United States | wru Name Dictionary — US surnames, Census 2010 subset (Khanna et al.) | — | — | — |
Reference works 5
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- 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 Gannon mean, and where does it come from?
- From Irish Gaelic Mag Fhionndin, 'son of Fionndin', a name meaning 'little white or fair person'. Recorded by Encyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history].
- In which country does Gannon have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 15 thousand people named Gannon, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled gannon.
- How common is the name Gannon?
- In the United States, the national register counted 14,981 people named Gannon in 2010, about 1 in 22 thousand residents.
- How common is Gannon compared with other names?
- In Ireland, Gannon is the 275th most common surname of 73,729 surnames recorded there.
What do you want to know about Gannon?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/gannonThe same payload this page is built from: spellings and scripts, countries and languages, related names, and the registers that attest the form. Rate-limited for casual use; a free API key gives 1,000 requests a day, and bulk access is licensed separately.
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, “Gannon” — the 275th most common surname in Ireland. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.