Koyama
surname · Latin script
Meaning: ‘small mountain’. Another common pronunciation is Oyama
Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published
/koʊˈjɑmə/(machine-generated) pronunciation, model-generated
Koyama is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in Japan than in any other country.
- JPJapan≈1 in 1.5K(inferred from the name graph)
- USUnited States1 in 418K
- PGPapua New Guinea≈1 in 32K
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.
- Japan (inferred from the name graph)
- Sources
- 138 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 1.5K (inferred from the name graph)
≈81,000 people, est.
Highest-authority source
Japan, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Meaning & origin(measured from records)
‘small mountain’. Another common pronunciation is Oyama. Both are found throughout Japan, as are several locations by this name. Many descend from Fujiwara no Hidesato (10th century), of the northern branch of the Fujiwara clan.
Sources 1
- Dictionary of American Family Names
Attested across 2 languages in the etymology graph.
Where in the world(measured from records)
Koyama 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 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| JP Japan | #316 | ≈81,000 est. | ≈1 in 1.5K | — | Koyama | 135 |
| BR Brazil | — | 949 | 1 in 223K | 949 | — | 1 |
| US United States | — | 795 | 1 in 418K | 809 | Koyama | 138 |
| PG Papua New Guinea | — | ≈220 est. | ≈1 in 32K | 1 | — | — |
| CA Canada | — | ≈130 est. | ≈1 in 284K | — | Koyama | 18 |
| EE Estonia | — | ≈28 est. | ≈1 in 44K | listed | — | — |
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 2020; IBGE — Censo 2022 Nomes no Brasil per-token lookup (v3 API, given+surname); PNG Election Results Database — candidate names (1972–2022); the ee-siseministeerium-registry 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).
Notable people with this name(measured from records)
- Shigeru Kōyamab. 1929JPJapanese actor (1929–2017)
- Akiko Koyamab. 1935JPJapanese actress
- Tsutomu Koyamab. 1936JPJapanese volleyball player (1936–2012)
- Takao Koyamab. 1948JPJapanese screenwriter
- Mami Koyamab. 1955JPJapanese actress, voice actress and narrator
- Rikiya Koyamab. 1963JPJapanese actor and voice actor
- Kundō Koyamab. 1964JPJapanese writer
- Tsuyoshi Koyamab. 1967JPJapanese voice actor
- Shinichiro Koyamab. 1978JPJapanese baseball player
- Hikaru Koyamab. 1991JPJapanese fashion model and singer
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 17 sources across 10 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| EE Estonia | Siseministeerium — population register name list 2023 | 2023 | — | — |
Reference works 3
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- 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
- Where does the name Koyama come from?
- ‘small mountain’. Another common pronunciation is Oyama. Both are found throughout Japan, as are several locations by this name. Recorded by Dictionary of American Family Names.
- How do you pronounce Koyama?
- A machine transcription gives /koʊˈjɑmə/ (IPA) for Japanese.
- What does the name Koyama mean?
- Recorded meaning: ‘small mountain’. Another common pronunciation is Oyama.
- In which country does Koyama have the most bearers?
- Mondonomo estimates about 81 thousand people named Koyama in Japan, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled koyama.
- How common is the name Koyama?
- In Brazil, the national register counted 949 people named Koyama, about 1 in 223 thousand residents.
- How common is Koyama compared with other names?
- In Japan, Koyama is the 316th most common surname of 142,159 surnames recorded there.
What do you want to know about Koyama?
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/koyamaThe 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, “Koyama” — the 316th most common surname in Japan. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.