Chõ
surname · Latin script
Chõ is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in South Korea than in any other country, where it is the 4th most common surname. Recorded meaning: From Korean 조(趙) (Jo) and 조(曺) (Jo). Chõ is also written 차오 in Korean (Hangul).
- SGSingapore≈1 in 5.9K(inferred from the name graph)
- GBUnited Kingdom≈1 in 17K
- PHPhilippines≈1 in 36K
carrying the name, as counted by its national register where one exists and as Mondonomo estimates it elsewhere (marked ≈ and "est." on hover). Where a country counts another spelling of the name rather than Chõ itself, the figure is that spelling’s, and it is named. Countries with no figure are shown too: flat where a national register lists the name without counting it, hatched where only our records hold it. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- South Korea (measured from records)
- #171 (measured from records)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Record sources
- 479 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 5.9K (inferred from the name graph)
2,340,582 named 최, 2015
of 19M surnames, spellings grouped
recorded for this name
corpus datasets behind its best-documented spelling
strongest: highest-authority source
Singapore, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Chõ in other scripts: Latin and Korean (Hangul)
(measured from records)Locally spelled Choi in US United States, CA Canada, MY Malaysia and 1 more, 최 in KR South Korea, MO Macao, Cho in SG Singapore and Choe in KP North Korea.
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 Korean 조(趙) (Jo) and 조(曺) (Jo).
Cited for this meaning 2
- 25,000 nombres de bebé. La mejor guía para escoger el nombre adecuado
- Wiktionary
Attested across 22 languages in the etymology graph.
Where the surname Chõ is found
(measured from records)Chõ 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 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| KR South Korea | #4 | 2,340,582as 최 | 1 in 22 | 2.4M | 최 | 291 |
| KP North Korea | #8 | ≈870,000 est. | ≈1 in 30 | 63 | Choe | 47 |
| US United States | #276 | 50,786as Choi | 1 in 6.5K | 55K | Choi | 479 |
| HK Hong Kong | #52 | ≈36,000 est. | ≈1 in 211 | — | Choi | 118 |
| CA Canada | #148 | ≈8,500 est. | ≈1 in 4.9K | 1 | Choi | 232 |
| MY Malaysia | #278 | ≈7,700 est. | ≈1 in 4.6K | — | Choi | 81 |
| MO Macao | — | ≈3,100 est. | ≈1 in 223 | — | 최 | 21 |
| SG Singapore | #195 | ≈1,000 est. | ≈1 in 5.9K | — | Cho | 100 |
2,340,582 people counted by KOSIS 2015 Census — surname population with hanja variants, 2015. 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: KOSIS 2015 Census — surname population with hanja variants; KOSIS — 2015 census surnames; Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010; Census Bureau — First Name Frequency 2020 by sex; Alberta Open Government — Frequency and Ranking of Baby Names by Year and Gender; Wikidata humans by citizenship — given & family names. 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).
Evidence
(measured from records)No register attests this spelling yet
Frequently asked questions
- What does the name Chõ mean, and where does it come from?
- From Korean 조(趙) (Jo) and 조(曺) (Jo). Recorded by 25,000 nombres de bebé. La mejor guía para escoger el nombre adecuado and Wiktionary.
- Which countries have the most people with the surname Chõ?
- In South Korea, the national register counted about 2.3 million people named 최, more than in any other country we hold. After it come North Korea, United States, Hong Kong and Canada; the country table on this page ranks them.
- How common is the name Chõ?
- In South Korea, the national register counted 2,340,582 people named 최 in 2015, about 1 in 22 residents.
- How common is Chõ compared with other names?
- In South Korea, Chõ is the 4th most common surname of 14,133 surnames recorded there.
What do you want to know about Chõ?
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/ch%C3%B5The 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, “Chõ” — ranked 5th in South Korea (KOSIS). Data snapshot 2026-10-13.