Nebel

surname · Latin script

Meaning, in English: A Hebrew stringed instrument, possibly the same as the nabla

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

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

Nebel is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country.

rarermore common
  • USUnited States1 in 146K(measured from records)
  • CHSwitzerland1 in 31K
  • DKDenmark1 in 35K

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)

2,272 people, 2010

Sources
255 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

1 in 31K (inferred from the name graph)

Switzerland

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Meaning & origin(measured from records)

A Hebrew stringed instrument, possibly the same as the nabla.

Sources 1

  • kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

Attested across 10 languages in the etymology graph.

How Nebel is read(measured from records)

Nebel 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.

  • English61%

    A Hebrew stringed instrument, possibly the same as the nabla.

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

  • German24%

    fog, mist, haze

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

    from a weather nickname meaning 'fog'

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

    from OHG Nebul; also forms from Nibel

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

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 We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.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)

Nebel 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 Nebel is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
US United States2,2721 in 146K2.3KNebel255
ID Indonesia≈810 est.≈1 in 328K—Nebel5
NG Nigeria≈290 est.≈1 in 735K—Nebel1
CH Switzerland2731 in 31K273Nebel13
GB United Kingdom≈230 est.≈1 in 287K57Nebel53
DK Denmark1701 in 35K170—2
UY Uruguay941 in 36K94——
NO Norway281 in 195K28—1

2,272 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; Surnames of England and Wales (taliesin-arlein.net, Sept 2002 electoral register); BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames); Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts); INE Uruguay — Apellidos más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public); SSB — Navnesøk (name-search service, 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)

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

  • Spanish surname2 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Argentina, Uruguay, Chile

    Also written Nébel

  • French surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in France, United States, Switzerland, Canada

    Also written Nébel

  • Hindi surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Switzerland

    Languages: Hindi, Urdu

    Also written Nébel

42 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)

Nebel 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 goh, fog, mist, cloud

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

  • In Spanish, nabla; nebel

    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)

17001800190020002100Ferdinand Nebel, b. 1782Carl Nebel, b. 1805Hermann Nebel, b. 1816Otto Nebel, b. 1892Rudolf Nebel, b. 1894Carmen Nebel, b. 1956Bernhard Nebel, b. 1956Wolfgang Nebel, b. 1956Moritz Nebel, b. 1991Paul Nebel, b. 2002

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 Nebel,
InformalHello,

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 32 sources across 19 countries.

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 Nebel mean, and where does it come from?
A Hebrew stringed instrument, possibly the same as the nabla. Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
What are other forms of the name Nebel?
In the etymology graph, Nuel is a form of the same name in other languages.
How do you pronounce Nebel?
A machine transcription gives /ˈnɛbəɫ/ (IPA) for English.
In which country does Nebel have the most bearers?
In the United States, the national register counted about 2.3 thousand people named Nebel, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled nebel.
Where is Nebel most common?
Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Nebel is densest in Switzerland — about 1 in 31 thousand people — even though United States holds more of our records for it.
How common is the name Nebel?
In the United States, the national register counted 2,272 people named Nebel in 2010, about 1 in 146 thousand residents.

What do you want to know about Nebel?

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

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

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, “Nebel”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Nebel parses inside a full name →