Alter
surname · Latin script
Meaning, in English: To change the form or structure of
(measured from records)Officially recorded in 23 countries · latest register: BFS, 2024
/ˈɑl.təɹ/(recorded in a dictionary) English · from Wiktionary
Alter is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in the United States than in any other country.
- ILIsrael≈1 in 19Kfew records(inferred from the name graph)
- DEGermany≈1 in 37K
- CHSwitzerland1 in 57K
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 Alter itself, the figure is that spelling’s, and it is named. One hue, darker where it is more common; hover a country for its figure.
- United States (measured from records)
- 2 (measured from records)
- Record sources
- 328 (measured from records)
- ≈1 in 19K (inferred from the name graph)
3,830 people, 2010
recorded for this name
corpus datasets behind its best-documented spelling
strongest: highest-authority source
Israel, est.
measured from records inferred from the name graph
Spellings & scripts
(measured from records)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)To change the form or structure of.
Cited for this meaning 1
- kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Attested across 11 languages in the etymology graph.
How Alter is read
(measured from records)Alter is one spelling over 2 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.
- English73%
To change the form or structure of.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
- German6.3%
inflection of alt:
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
Familienname zu einem persönlichen Merkmal: 'der Alte/älter'; Belegzahl 1192.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 5: Familiennamen nach Beruf und persönlichen Merkmalen
Übername zu mhd. alt 'alt'; ohne Bearer-Count.
as a nameDeutscher Familiennamenatlas, Band 5: Familiennamen nach Beruf und persönlichen Merkmalen
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)Alter 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 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | 3,830 | 1 in 87K | 3.8K | Alter | 328 |
| DE Germany | ≈2,200 est. | ≈1 in 37K | listed | Alter | 103 |
| IL Israel | ≈540 est. | ≈1 in 19K | 29 | Alter | 37 |
| GB United Kingdom | ≈540 est. | ≈1 in 129K | — | Alter | 74 |
| CA Canada | ≈520 est. | ≈1 in 79K | — | Alter | 72 |
| SY Syria | ≈370 est. | ≈1 in 67K | — | Alter | 6 |
| CH Switzerland | 147 | 1 in 57K | 147 | Alter | 17 |
| EE Estonia | ≈63 est. | ≈1 in 22K | 49 | Alter | 6 |
3,830 people counted by Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010, 2010. 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; the dfa-band-5 register; CBS Israel — Names given to babies (1949–present); BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames); the ee-stat-nimed 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)Alter is also recorded in 2 other lexicons, as a different name or as an ordinary word. These are senses of the spelling, not of the name above.
In Danish, altar, a table or a platform for making sacrifices.
as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)
In Indonesian, to alter, to tailor clothes to make them fit
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)- David Alterb. 1807USAmerican inventor and scientist (1807–1881)
- Franciszek Ksawery Alterb. 1889PLPolish general (1889-1945)
- Wiktor Alterb. 1890PLJewish socialist activist and publicist (1890–1943)
- Israel Alterb. 1901USAustrian-Hungarian Jewish cantor and composer, regarded as "the one Chasanim, the cantor of the cantors" (1901–1975)
- Louis Alterb. 1902USAmerican pianist, songwriter and composer (1902-1980)
- Hobart Alterb. 1933USAmerican businessman (1933-2014)
- Harvey J. Alterb. 1935USAmerican medical researcher
- Robert Alterb. 1935USAmerican professor (b. 1935)
- Tom Alterb. 1950INIndian actor (1950–2017)
- Cat Alterb. 1989USactress
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)46 registers and reference works attest this spelling, across 23 countries.
| Country | Register | Year | Count | Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2010 | 2010 | 3.8K | #8,597 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2000 | 2000 | 3.7K | #8,176 |
| US United States | Census Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020 | 2020 | 3.6K | #8,652 |
| CH Switzerland | BFS — Familiennamen der Wohnbevölkerung (surnames) | 2024 | 147 | #8,088 |
| EE Estonia | Statistics Estonia — per-name Population Register counts (nimed) | — | 49 | #1,965 |
| EE Estonia | Statistics Estonia — per-name Population Register counts (nimed) | — | 34 | #3,045 |
| DE Germany | Deutscher Familiennamenatlas Band 5 | — | — | — |
| US United States | wru Name Dictionary — US surnames, Census 2010 subset (Khanna et al.) | — | — | — |
Reference works 7
- Dictionary of American Family Names
- Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
- Nişanyan Adlar (Turkish given-name national-registry frequency)
- Wikipedia surname 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
- Hoffman, Polish Surnames: Origins and Meanings (2nd ed., 2012)
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 Alter mean, and where does it come from?
- To change the form or structure of. Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
- What are other forms of the name Alter?
- In the etymology graph, Alt is a form of the same name in other languages.
- How do you pronounce Alter?
- In English /ˈɑl.təɹ/ (Wiktionary).
- In which country does Alter have the most bearers?
- In the United States, the national register counted about 3.8 thousand people named Alter, more than in any other country we hold, where it is most often spelled alter.
- How common is the name Alter?
- In the United States, the national register counted 3,830 people named Alter in 2010, about 1 in 87 thousand residents.
What do you want to know about Alter?
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/alterThe 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, “Alter”. Data snapshot 2026-10-13.