Strahl

surname · Latin script

Meaning: shtral or Ger. Strahl ray of light, sunbeam (MHG strale flash of lightning, arrow, OHG strata)

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

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

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

rarermore common
  • DEGermany≈1 in 41K(inferred from the name graph)
  • USUnited States1 in 291K
  • CHSwitzerland1 in 18K

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)

≈2,000 people, est.

Sources
184 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

1 in 18K (inferred from the name graph)

Switzerland

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)

shtral or Ger. Strahl ray of light, sunbeam (MHG strale flash of lightning, arrow, OHG strata). It is possible that the name was adopted as a translation of any of the various Strand Strickland 515 Hebr. given names referring to light, such as Uri and Meir, but there is no evidence for this. Var.: Strahler.

Sources 1

  • A dictionary of surnames

Attested in 1 language in the etymology graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Strahl 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 Strahl is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
DE Germany≈2,000 est.≈1 in 41K—Strahl94
US United States1,1441 in 291K1.2KStrahl184
CH Switzerland4731 in 18K473Strahl19
TN Tunisia≈180 est.≈1 in 66K—Strahl3
CA Canada≈150 est.≈1 in 257K—Strahl34
CU Cuba≈130 est.≈1 in 89K—Strahl1
NZ New Zealand≈57 est.≈1 in 87K—Strahl17

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; Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2000; 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)

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

  • Polish surname5 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Poland, Czechia, United States, Slovakia

    Languages: Polish, Czech, Slovak

    Also written Strähl, Štrahl

  • a separate name2 spellings in the group

    Also written Strähl

  • Swedish surname5 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Sweden, United States, Denmark

    Languages: Swedish, Norwegian, Danish

    Also written Stråhl, Strähl

  • Hindi surname3 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, United Kingdom, Pakistan

    Languages: Hindi, Urdu

    Also written Strähl

  • Hungarian surname2 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Hungary

    Also written Stráhl

25 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)

Strahl is also recorded in 4 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.

  • shtral or Ger. Strahl ray of light, sunbeam (MHG strdle flash of lightning, arrow, OHG strata). It is possible that the name was adopted as a translation of any of the various Hebr. given names referring to light, such as C/rf and Meir, but there is no evidence for this. Var.: Strahler.

    as a nameThe Oxford Names Companion - The definitive guide to Surnames, First Names, and Place Names of the British Isles

  • In German, ray, beam

    as a wordA Frequency Dictionary of German

  • In German, beam, ray (e.g. of light)

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

  • In German, from ahd. strâla 'arrow, beam, ray'

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

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)

18001850190019502000Otho F. Strahl, b. 1831Hans Strahl, b. 1857Fedor Strahl, b. 1926Erwin Strahl, b. 1929Rudi Strahl, b. 1931Grigory Luch, b. 1931Chuck Strahl, b. 1957Marcus Strahl, b. 1968Mark Strahl, b. 1978Lina Larissa Strahl, b. 1997

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 Strahl,
InformalHello,

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 25 sources across 13 countries.

Official registers attesting Strahl
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 200020001.2K#21,156
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 201020101.1K#22,481
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 202020201.1K#23,940
CH SwitzerlandBFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames)202424#32,062
US United Stateswru Name Dictionary — US surnames, Census 2010 subset (Khanna et al.)———

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 Strahl mean, and where does it come from?
shtral or Ger. Strahl ray of light, sunbeam (MHG strale flash of lightning, arrow, OHG strata). Recorded by A dictionary of surnames.
How do you pronounce Strahl?
A machine transcription gives /ˈstɹɑɫ/ (IPA) for English.
In which country does Strahl have the most bearers?
Mondonomo estimates about 2.0 thousand people named Strahl in Germany, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled strahl.
Where is Strahl most common?
Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Strahl is densest in Switzerland — about 1 in 18 thousand people — even though Germany holds more of our records for it.
How common is the name Strahl?
In the United States, the national register counted 1,144 people named Strahl in 2010, about 1 in 291 thousand residents.

What do you want to know about Strahl?

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

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, “Strahl”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Strahl parses inside a full name →