Tan
Masculine · “New”
Tan is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 586 boys against 11 girls since 1880.
Tan is a short name that came to America from Vietnam and from the Chinese of Southeast Asia. In Vietnamese it is a given name meaning new, and in Hokkien it is the everyday sound of one of the commonest Chinese surnames.
How old is the name Tan?
Tan first appears in US birth records in 1976 — 49 years ago. The typical Tan alive today was born around 1992, making them about 33 years old. About 600 people named Tan are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Tan most popular?
Tan peaked in 1985, reaching #1975 nationally. See the whole 1985 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From Tân to Tan
The story of Tan
Vietnamese given names often carry a single hopeful word, and Tân means new, as in a new beginning; families arriving in America after the fall of Saigon brought it with them, and the diacritics dropped off on American forms. In Hokkien, the Chinese of Fujian, Taiwan, Singapore and Malaysia, the surname Mandarin says as Chen is pronounced Tan, and it is the commonest surname among Singapore's Chinese.
Meaningscholars disagree
'New', in Vietnamese
As a Vietnamese given name, Tân means 'new'; Tan is also the Hokkien and Teochew form of the Chinese surname Chen. Which a family meant is not recorded.
How the name formed
- Tân
- Tan
Related forms: Tân
Pronouncing Tan
TUN
In Vietnamese closer to TUHN; most Americans say TAN.
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1976
- Most boys named
- 198529 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #1975reached in 1985
- Change vs 2018
- +14.3%8 in 2019, from 7
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Tan in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Tân in Vietnamese — same name
Tans among us
people named Tan are estimated to be alive in the US today
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
Questions parents actually ask
Fashion outlook
Tan sits outside the current charts, and that is its own kind of answer: naming cycles can only date the names they carried up. A name this rare has no decade stamped on it — it cannot go out of fashion, because it was never in.
Based on 146 years of naming cycles. How we read them
The trade-off
- One syllable and easy to spell.
- A hopeful meaning.
- Rare, so a Tan is unlikely to meet another.
- English speakers will hear the word tan.
- Many will assume it is a surname.
- The spelling is recorded for a few girls, but nearly every Tan is a boy.
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Tan
Masculine
Frequently asked
- How many Tans are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 600 people named Tan are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Tan in 2025?
- Tan is rarely given in the US today — it does not rank in the top 2000 boy names.
- Will my child share the name Tan with classmates?
- Tan will almost certainly be the only one in school.
More T names
The most-given names starting with T, all years combined.
Thomas#34 · Timothy#203 · Tyler#219 · Terry#1115 · Theodore#4 · Travis#434 · Todd#1609 · Tony#783
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Tan? See the current top 100.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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