Cable
surname · Latin script
Meaning: of rope, especially the type of stout rope used in maritime applications, from ANF cable cable (LL capulum halter, of Arabic origin, but associated by folk etymology with L capere to take, seize)
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
/keɪbl/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Cable is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in India than in any other country.
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 25K(inferred from the name graph)
- CACanada≈1 in 34K
- USUnited States1 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.
- India (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 345 (measured from records)
- 1 in 11K (inferred from the name graph)
≈25,000 people, est.
Highest-authority source
St. Kitts & Nevis
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
of rope, especially the type of stout rope used in maritime applications, from ANF cable cable (LL capulum halter, of Arabic origin, but associated by folk etymology with L capere to take, seize). Var.: Cabel.
Sources 1
- A dictionary of surnames
Attested across 15 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Cable 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| IN India | ≈25,000 est. | ≈1 in 54K | — | Cable | 17 |
| US United States | 9,545 | 1 in 35K | 9.6K | Cable | 345 |
| GB United Kingdom | ≈2,600 est. | ≈1 in 25K | 3.2K | Cable | 176 |
| CA Canada | ≈1,100 est. | ≈1 in 34K | — | Cable | 98 |
| IT Italy | ≈790 est. | ≈1 in 79K | — | Cable | 6 |
| NZ New Zealand | ≈250 est. | ≈1 in 20K | — | Cable | 35 |
| SG Singapore | ≈200 est. | ≈1 in 31K | — | Cable | 6 |
| KN St. Kitts & Nevis | 5 | 1 in 11K | 5 | — | 4 |
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; Surnames of England and Wales (taliesin-arlein.net, Sept 2002 electoral register); St Kitts & Nevis — Register of Electors 2026. 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)
Cable 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 English, A long object used to make a physical connection.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In English, maker of ship’s ropes
as a nameEncyclopedia of surnames [the complete companion to tracing your names history]
In English, ngéa, ngéya wa = yéya wa
as a wordVocabulary of the Mende Language
In enm, A cable or strong rope (as used in nautical applications)
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In fro, Old Northern French form of chable
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)
- Joseph Cableb. 1801USAmerican politician
- George Washington Cableb. 1844USAmerican novelist (1844–1925)
- Mildred Cableb. 1878GBChristian missionary in Central Asia (1878-1952)
- Tommy Cableb. 1900GBEnglish footballer and manager (1900-1986)
- Soup Cableb. 1913USAmerican professional basketball player (1913-1995)
- James Cableb. 1920GBBritish diplomat (1920–2001)
- Barney Cableb. 1935USAmerican basketball player (born 1935)
- Vince Cableb. 1943GBBritish politician (born 1943)
- Bill Cableb. 1946USAmerican actor (1946-1998)
- Elliot Cableactor
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 25 sources across 13 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 291 | #29,625 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2019 | 16 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 1976 | 11 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2012 | 10 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 1999 | 9 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2020 | 8 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2011 | 8 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2010 | 8 | — |
| US United States | Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex | 2020 | 7 | #29,625 |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2015 | 7 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2013 | 7 | — |
| US United States | SSA — National Baby Names (1880–present) | 2004 | 7 | — |
Reference works 4
- The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia surname tokens
- Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
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 Cable mean, and where does it come from?
- of rope, especially the type of stout rope used in maritime applications, from ANF cable cable (LL capulum halter, of Arabic origin, but associated by folk etymology with L capere to take, seize). Recorded by A dictionary of surnames.
- How do you pronounce Cable?
- A machine transcription gives /keɪbl/ (IPA) for English.
- In which country does Cable have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 25 thousand people named Cable in India, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled cable.
- Where is Cable most common?
- Measured as a share of residents rather than as a count, Cable is densest in St. Kitts & Nevis — about 1 in 11 thousand people — even though India holds more of our records for it.
- How common is the name Cable?
- In the United States, the national register counted 9,545 people named Cable in 2010, about 1 in 35 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Cable?
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/cableThe 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, “Cable”. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.