Kalle
given name · Latin script
Meaning, in Swedish: a diminutive of the male given name Karl
Recorded as a male name· opposite-gender records fall within measured source noise
/ˈkɑlle/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Kalle is a given name written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Finland than in any other country. In Estonia it is the 74th most common given name.
- FIFinland1 in 318(measured from records)
- EEEstonia≈1 in 897
- SESweden1 in 2.6K
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.
- Finland (measured from records)
- Sources
- 111 (measured from records)
- 1 in 318 (inferred from the name graph)
17,537 people
Highest-authority source
Finland
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
Kalle är ursprungligen en smekform till → Karl. Det är först i modern tid som Kalle mer allmänt har brukats som ett officiellt förnamn. I den finlandssvenska almanackan 28 januari.
Sources 1
- Förnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
Attested across 10 languages in the etymology graph.
How Kalle is read(measured from records)
Kalle is one spelling over 5 language communities, and the dictionaries record it differently in 2 of them. Each row is what a source recorded for that language, beside the share of this name’s records the language holds. No single row is the name’s meaning.
- Finnish23%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Kalle in Finnish.
- German16%
männl. Vom., schwedische und fin nische Koseform von
as a nameDUDEN Lexikon der Vornamen
- English13%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Kalle in English.
- Swedish9.5%
Kalle är ursprungligen en smekform till → Karl. Det är först i modern tid som Kalle mer allmänt har brukats som ett officiellt förnamn. I den finlandssvenska almanackan 28 januari.
as a nameFörnamn i Sverige. Kortfattat namnlexikon
a diminutive of the male given name Karl
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
- Estonian7.7%
No dictionary in our sources glosses Kalle in Estonian.
The share is ours — how much of this name’s records each language holds. The sense beside it is the source’s, quoted and credited, including where it names a gender. We do not publish a gender of our own per language: our records carry one figure for the spelling as a whole.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Kalle 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.
17,537 people counted by DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register). 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: DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register); DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup); Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population); Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts); Statistics Estonia — Ees- ja perekonnanimed (Population Register). 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)
Kalle is also recorded in 3 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
Fuerte
as a name25,000 nombres de bebé. La mejor guía para escoger el nombre adecuado
Swedish: pet form of KARL . The name is now also used to some extent in Germany.
as a word
In vls, despicable or disagreeable person, typically a woman
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)
- Kalle Anttilab. 1887FIFinnish wrestler (1887–1949)
- Kalle Tuominenb. 1908FIathletics competitor (1908-2006)
- Ahti Karjalainenb. 1923FInot in their usual nameFinnish politician and Prime Minister (1923–1990)
- Kalle Svenssonb. 1925SESwedish association football player (1925-2000)
- Niilo Halonenb. 1940FInot in their usual nameFinnish ski jumper (1940–2025)
- Kalle Lasnb. 1942EEEstonian-Canadian film maker, author, magazine editor and activist (born 1942)
- Kalle Könkköläb. 1950FIFinnish politician
- Kalle Kiiskinenb. 1975FIFinnish male curler
- Kalle Keiturib. 1984FIFinnish ski jumper
- Kalle Rovanperäb. 2000FIFinnish race car driver (born 2000)
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)
A formal English salutation is built on the surname, so it needs a full name — on its own, a first name only supports the informal form.
Evidence(measured from records)
Attested in 55 sources across 25 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 40K | #51 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Etunimitilasto (Finnish given names register) | — | 18K | — |
| SE Sweden | Skatteverket — Sök hur många som har ett visst namn (living population) | — | 3.9K | #706 |
| SE Sweden | SCB — Namnstatistik (to 2023) | 2020 | 2.6K | — |
| DK Denmark | Danmarks Statistik — Hvor mange hedder...? (living-population name counts) | — | 2.2K | #219 |
| EE Estonia | Statistics Estonia — Ees- ja perekonnanimed (Population Register) | — | 2.1K | #79 |
| EE Estonia | Statistics Estonia — per-name Population Register counts (nimed) | — | 2.1K | #79 |
| DK Denmark | Danmarks Statistik — Navne til nyfødte (1985–present) | 2024 | 171 | #40 |
| FI Finland | DVV — Nimipalvelu (Finnish name service, per-name lookup) | — | 23 | #20,367 |
| EE Estonia | Siseministeerium — population register name list 2023 | 2023 | — | — |
Reference works 4
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Wikipedia given-name 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
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
- Is Kalle a male or female name?
- Kalle is a male name in our records. Opposite-gender entries fall within the cross-gender noise we measure in the source data, so we don't report them as usage.
- How do you pronounce Kalle?
- A machine transcription gives /ˈkɑlle/ (IPA) for Finnish.
- What does the name Kalle mean?
- In Swedish, a diminutive of the male given name Karl
- What are other forms of the name Kalle?
- In the etymology graph, Carlos, Charles and Carol are forms of the same name in other languages; it is recorded as a short form of Kaarlo and Kaarle.
- In which country does Kalle have the most bearers?
- In Finland, the national register counted about 18 thousand people named Kalle, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled kalle.
- Where is Kalle most common?
- Kalle is densest in Finland, where the national register counts about 1 in 318 people carrying it.
- How common is the name Kalle?
- In Finland, the national register counted 17,537 people named Kalle, about 1 in 318 residents.
- How common is Kalle compared with other names?
- In Finland, Kalle is the 153rd most common given name of 19,056 given names recorded there.
What do you want to know about Kalle?
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/kalleThe 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, “Kalle” — the 153rd most common given name in Finland. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.