Karahan

surname · Latin script

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

Karahan is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Türkiye than in any other country. Recorded meaning: Tarihte bazı kavimlerde hanlara verilen san.

rarermore common
  • TRTürkiye≈1 in 1.6K(inferred from the name graph)
  • CYCyprus≈1 in 15K
  • AZAzerbaijan≈1 in 20K

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.

Türkiye (inferred from the name graph)

≈52,000 people, est.

Sources
109 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

≈1 in 1.6K (inferred from the name graph)

Türkiye, est.

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Spellings & scripts(measured from records)

Locally spelled Qaraxan in AZ Azerbaijan.

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

recorded in Turkish

Tarihte bazı kavimlerde hanlara verilen san.

Sources 1

  • TDK Kişi Adları Sözlüğü (official Turkish given-name dictionary)

Where in the world(measured from records)

Karahan 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 Karahan is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
TR Türkiye#189≈52,000 est.≈1 in 1.6K—Karahan109
CN China—≈10,000 est.≈1 in 138K—Karahan3
AZ Azerbaijan—≈520 est.≈1 in 20K7Qaraxan7
FR France—≈450 est.≈1 in 151K83Karahan1
AT Austria—≈320 est.≈1 in 28K4——
CH Switzerland—1671 in 50K167Karahan12
CY Cyprus#969≈83 est.≈1 in 15K—Karahan12

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: BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames); INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000); Azerbaijan Ministry of Justice — Civil Registry Name Statistics; Statistik Austria — STATatlas Vornamen WFS (per-name time series 1984–2024). 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)

Karahan is also recorded as 4 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • German surname5 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Germany, Türkiye, United States, Austria

    Languages: German, English, Dutch

    Also written K'Arahan

  • Spanish surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Türkiye, United States, Netherlands

    Languages: Spanish, Portuguese

    Also written Karahán

  • Russian surname11 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Russia, Türkiye, Ukraine, Kazakhstan

    Languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Polish

    Also written Карахан, Karakhan, Kàřähàñ

  • Bulgarian surname9 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Türkiye, Bulgaria

    Languages: Bulgarian, Croatian, Serbian

    Also written Карахан

34 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)

Karahan is also recorded in one other lexicon, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

  • In Cebuano, the hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata)

    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)

19201940196019802000Saim Osman Karahan, b. 1939Demir Karahan, b. 1944Hakan Karahan, b. 1960Enver Karahan, b. 1962Zeynep Karahan Uslu, b. 1969Murat Karahan, b. 1977Fatih Karahan, b. 1982Ferit Karahan, b. 1983Pelin Karahan, b. 1984

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 26 sources across 14 countries.

Official registers attesting Karahan
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
CH SwitzerlandBFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames)2024167#7,266
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)199183—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)198155—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)197112—
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1961——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1951——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1941——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1931——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1921——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1911——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1901——
FR FranceINSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000)1891——

Reference works 4

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 Karahan mean?
Recorded meaning: Tarihte bazı kavimlerde hanlara verilen san.
In which country does Karahan have the most bearers?
Mondonomo estimates about 52 thousand people named Karahan in Türkiye, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled karahan.
How common is the name Karahan?
In Switzerland, the national register counted 167 people named Karahan in 2024, about 1 in 50 thousand residents.
How common is Karahan compared with other names?
In Türkiye, Karahan is the 189th most common surname of 619,652 surnames recorded there.

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Query this name via API
curl https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/karahan

The 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, “Karahan” — the 189th most common surname in Türkiye. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Karahan parses inside a full name →