Vetter
surname · Latin script
Meaning: from the kinship term Vetter 'father's brother'; also from the Germanic byname stem with compounds
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
/vɛtɚ/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Vetter is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Germany than in any other country.
- DEGermany≈1 in 4.5K(inferred from the name graph)
- USUnited States1 in 39K
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 65K
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 (measured from records)
- Sources
- 338 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 4.5K (inferred from the name graph)
≈18,000 people, est.
recorded for this name
Highest-authority source
Germany, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
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 the kinship term Vetter 'father's brother'; also from the Germanic byname stem with compounds
Sources 1
- Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung
Attested across 3 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Vetter 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 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| DE Germany | #302 | ≈18,000 est. | ≈1 in 4.5K | — | Vetter | 169 |
| US United States | — | 8,550 | 1 in 39K | 8.6K | Vetter | 338 |
| FR France | — | ≈1,600 est. | ≈1 in 42K | 199 | — | 9 |
| CH Switzerland | #663 | 1,195 | 1 in 7K | 1.2K | Vetter | 49 |
| GB United Kingdom | — | ≈1,000 est. | ≈1 in 65K | 76 | Vetter | 61 |
| AT Austria | — | ≈470 est. | ≈1 in 19K | — | Vetter | 56 |
| DK Denmark | — | 162 | 1 in 36K | 162 | — | 1 |
| NZ New Zealand | — | ≈150 est. | ≈1 in 32K | — | Vetter | 14 |
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); INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000); Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts). 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)
Vetter is also recorded in 5 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In German, male cousin
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In German, Personenname aus Verwandtschaftsbezeichnung (mnd. vedder(e) 'Vaterbruder, Onkel'); 8812 Belege.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 5: Familiennamen nach Beruf und persönlichen Merkmalen
In German, Familienname zu persönl. Merkmal/Verwandtschaftsbezeichnung „Vetter“; ggf. auch Benennung als Pflegesohn eines Vetters. Bearer count: 22
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 5: Familiennamen nach Beruf und persönlichen Merkmalen
In German, "Vatersbruder"; Vetter |s, l(e) (in), Ii, mann, dietz; Vötter, l(e); nd. Vedder(mann); Traut- vetter, Heine | vetter, fet- ter; Fetter; Feddersen, vgl. Feder. - Ahd. Feter scheint Zusammensetzun- gen gebildet zu haben; dazu Feder |olf, hardt; Fäder, |hold; Fähd(e)- rich, Vetterick, Fed(d)e- rich (x Friedrich), Fed- dersen 586 V e y h l V i n c e n s
as a nameDeutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung
In Swedish, present indicative of vetta
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)
- Max Vetterb. 1892DEGerman rower
- Heinz Oskar Vetterb. 1917DEGerman trade unionist and politician (1917–1990)
- Jasmin Vetterb. 1956DEGerman singer
- Farin Urlaubb. 1963DEnot in their usual nameGerman rock musician
- Marcus Vetterb. 1967DEGerman film director and cinematographer
- David Vetterb. 1971USAmerican sufferer of severe combined immunodeficiency (1971–1984)
- Jessica Vetterb. 1985USice hockey player
- Maximilian Vetterb. 1987DEGerman film producer
- Johannes Vetterb. 1993DEGerman athletics competitor
- Anouk Vetterb. 1993NLDutch athletics competitor
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)
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 31 sources across 19 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010 | 2010 | 8.6K | #4,142 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2000 | 2000 | 8.4K | #3,860 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020 | 2020 | 8.1K | #4,231 |
| CH Switzerland | BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames) | 2024 | 1.2K | #968 |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1951 | 290 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1941 | 258 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1961 | 241 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1971 | 237 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1981 | 218 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1991 | 199 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1931 | 191 | — |
| FR France | INSEE — Fichier des noms de famille (1891–2000) | 1901 | 169 | — |
Reference works 6
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
- Rymut, Słownik nazwisk współcześnie w Polsce używanych (10 vols, IJP PAN, Kraków 1992–1994) — every Polish surname in the PESEL register at the end of 1990, with bearer counts nationally and per voivodeship1990
- jeantosti.com — Dictionnaire des noms de famille de France et d'ailleurs (Jean Tosti)
- Søndergaard, Georg, Danske efternavne (Lademann 1984/1991)
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 Vetter mean, and where does it come from?
- from the kinship term Vetter 'father's brother'; also from the Germanic byname stem with compounds Recorded by Deutsche Namenkunde: Unsere Familiennamen nach ihrer Entstehung und Bedeutung.
- How do you pronounce Vetter?
- A machine transcription gives /vɛtɚ/ (IPA) for English.
- In which country does Vetter have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 18 thousand people named Vetter in Germany, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled vetter.
- How common is the name Vetter?
- In the United States, the national register counted 8,550 people named Vetter in 2010, about 1 in 39 thousand residents.
- How common is Vetter compared with other names?
- In Germany, Vetter is the 302nd most common surname of 765,306 surnames recorded there.
What do you want to know about Vetter?
Nobody replies to these one by one, but what readers ask decides what these pages answer next.
Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/vetterThe 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, “Vetter” — the 302nd most common surname in Germany. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.