Zan
surname · Latin script
Meaning: A diminutive of the female given names Susan, Susanne, Suzanne, or Susanna
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/z̪an̪/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Zan is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in China than in any other country.
- MYMalaysia≈1 in 11K(inferred from the name graph)
- TRTürkiye≈1 in 25K
- SISlovenia1 in 46K
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.
- China (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 264 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 11K (inferred from the name graph)
≈24,000 people, est.
Highest-authority source
Malaysia, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts(measured from records)
Locally spelled Žan in SI Slovenia.
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
A diminutive of the female given names Susan, Susanne, Suzanne, or Susanna.
Sources 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested across 30 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Zan 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CN China | ≈24,000 est. | ≈1 in 57K | — | Zan | 23 |
| TR Türkiye | ≈3,300 est. | ≈1 in 25K | — | Zan | 22 |
| MY Malaysia | ≈3,000 est. | ≈1 in 11K | — | Zan | 28 |
| IN India | ≈2,300 est. | ≈1 in 570K | 8 | — | 16 |
| BR Brazil | 1,763 | 1 in 120K | 1.8K | — | 3 |
| SG Singapore | ≈120 est. | ≈1 in 52K | — | Zan | 24 |
| SI Slovenia | 46 | 1 in 46K | 7.6K | Žan | 33 |
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: stat.si Imena rojstva — full name register (per-token frequency + rank); IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname); naampy — India given names from state electoral rolls (in-rolls). 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)
Zan 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 Italian, redução popular de Zane, Zanni; típica do norte italiano
as a nameDicionário dos sobrenomes italianos
In English, lang., people, Caucasus
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, lang., people, Africa
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In English, Zande [Azande]
as a namePronouncing Dictionary of Proper Names
In Italian, Variante di Zanni
as a nameDizionario dei cognomi italiani
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)
- Zan Jurunb. 908Song dynasty person CBDB=44076
- Zan Chengb. 1437Ming dynasty person CBDB = 199314
- Tomasz Zanb. 1796BYPolish poet and activist (1796–1855)
- Alessandro Zanb. 1973ITItalian politician
- Gökhan Zanb. 1981TRTurkish association football player (born 1981)
- Zan RuxinMing dynasty person CBDB = 129287
- Zan RenqingMing dynasty person CBDB = 243338
- Zan RenmeiMing dynasty person CBDB = 243339
- Zan LangMing dynasty person CBDB = 243340
- Zan YingMing dynasty person CBDB = 243345
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 55 sources across 32 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BR Brazil | IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname) | — | 1.8K | #5,489 |
| IN India | Instate — India surnames by state (real counts) from electoral rolls | — | 13 | #14,841 |
Reference works 5
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- 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
- Hoffman, Polish Surnames: Origins and Meanings (2nd ed., 2012)
- Cognomix.it (Nomix s.r.l.) — Italian surname origin dictionary
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 Zan mean, and where does it come from?
- A diminutive of the female given names Susan, Susanne, Suzanne, or Susanna. Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- How do you pronounce Zan?
- A machine transcription gives /z̪an̪/ (IPA) for Turkish.
- In which country does Zan have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 24 thousand people named Zan in China, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled zan.
- How common is the name Zan?
- In Brazil, the national register counted 1,763 people named Zan, about 1 in 120 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Zan?
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/zanThe 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, “Zan”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.