Knorr

surname · Latin script

Meaning, in English: from Knarr Fm or Lake (Cambridgeshire); first attested Richard de Knarre, de Knorre 1279

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

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

Knorr is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Germany than in any other country.

rarermore common
  • DEGermany≈1 in 8.5K(inferred from the name graph)
  • CACanada≈1 in 57K
  • 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.

Germany (inferred from the name graph)

≈9,500 people, est.

Sources
289 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

≈1 in 8.5K (inferred from the name graph)

Germany, est.

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Spellings & scripts(measured from records)

One other spelling is counted as the same name:

Spellings marked ● are how people bearing the name write it in our records, and ○ marks a model's transliteration; click a spelling to open its page.

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

from Knarr Fm or Lake (Cambridgeshire); first attested Richard de Knarre, de Knorre 1279.

Sources 1

  • A Dictionary of English Surnames

Attested across 11 languages in the etymology graph.

How Knorr is read(measured from records)

Knorr is one spelling over 2 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.

  • English63%

    from Knarr Fm or Lake (Cambridgeshire); first attested Richard de Knarre, de Knorre 1279.

    as a nameA Dictionary of English Surnames

    Alternative form of knarr (“large merchant ship used in mediaeval Scandinavia”).

    as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

  • German25%

    from a nickname for a knotted, rough, or tough person

    as a nameDeutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung

    Übername zu mhd. knorre, für kleine, beleibte Menschen; auch für knorrige Personen. Bearer count: 4357.

    as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 5: Familiennamen nach Beruf und persönlichen Merkmalen

    Nachname aus persönlichem Merkmal: knorrig, krumm oder gedrungen.

    as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 5: Familiennamen nach Beruf und persönlichen Merkmalen

The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Knorr 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 Knorr is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
DE Germany#623≈9,500 est.≈1 in 8.5KlistedKnorr150
US United States—4,3331 in 77K4.3KKnorr289
GH Ghana—≈1,600 est.≈1 in 18K—Knorr5
CA Canada—≈670 est.≈1 in 57K—Knorr80
GB United Kingdom—≈620 est.≈1 in 106K—Knorr60
CH Switzerland—2001 in 42K200Knorr20
AT Austria—≈160 est.≈1 in 57K—Knorr34

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 dfa-band-5 register; BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames). 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)

Knorr is also recorded as 6 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • Spanish surname5 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Brazil, Argentina, Spain

    Languages: Spanish, Portuguese

    Also written Knörr

  • a separate name3 spellings in the group

    Also written Knörr, Knórr

  • Russian surname12 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Russia, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, United States

    Languages: Russian, Ukrainian, Polish

    Also written Кнорр, Кньорр, Knörr

  • Hindi surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, United Kingdom

    Languages: Hindi, Urdu

    Also written Knörr

  • a separate name2 spellings in the group

    Also written Knörr

  • Korean surname2 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, South Korea

    Also written Knörr

45 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)

Knorr 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.

  • from Middle High, Middle Low German knorre. Middle Dutch cnorre ‘knot’, ‘gnarl’, ‘protruberance’, hence a nickname for a gnarled person.

    as a nameDictionary of American Family 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)

18001850190019502000Carl Heinrich Theodor Knorr, b. 1800Eduard von Knorr, b. 1840Iwan Knorr, b. 1853Ludwig Knorr, b. 1859Georg Knorr, b. 1859Nathan Homer Knorr, b. 1905Wilbur Richard Knorr, b. 1945Thomas Knorr, b. 1971Geoff Knorr, b. 1985Juri Knorr, b. 2000

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 Knorr,
InformalHello,

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 30 sources across 18 countries.

Official registers attesting Knorr
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 201020104.3K#7,665
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 200020004.2K#7,314
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 202020204K#7,955
CH SwitzerlandBFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames)202493#11,723
DE GermanyDeutscher Familiennamenatlas Band 5———
US United Stateswru Name Dictionary — US surnames, Census 2010 subset (Khanna et al.)———

Reference works 6

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 Knorr mean, and where does it come from?
from Knarr Fm or Lake (Cambridgeshire); first attested Richard de Knarre, de Knorre 1279. Recorded by A Dictionary of English Surnames.
How do you pronounce Knorr?
A machine transcription gives /ˈnɔɹ/ (IPA) for English.
In which country does Knorr have the most bearers?
Mondonomo estimates about 9.5 thousand people named Knorr in Germany, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled knorr.
How common is the name Knorr?
In the United States, the national register counted 4,333 people named Knorr in 2010, about 1 in 77 thousand residents.
How common is Knorr compared with other names?
In Germany, Knorr is the 623rd most common surname of 765,306 surnames recorded there.

What do you want to know about Knorr?

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

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, “Knorr” — the 623rd most common surname in Germany. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Knorr parses inside a full name →