Cha

surname · Latin script

Recorded for both men and women· direction only, no split published

Cha is a surname written in the Latin script, with more bearers in South Korea than in any other country, where it is the 35th most common surname. Recorded meaning: tea, sometimes (dialect) specifically masala chai.

rarermore common
  • USUnited States1 in 34K(measured from records)
  • KRSouth Korea1 in 266as 차
  • KPNorth Korea≈1 in 1.7K

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 Cha 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.

South Korea (measured from records)

194,788 named 차, 2015

2 (measured from records)

recorded for this name

Sources
214 (measured from records)

Highest-authority source

≈1 in 1.7K (inferred from the name graph)

North Korea, est.

measured from records inferred from the name graph

Name dossier (print, CSV)

Spellings & scripts(measured from records)

ChaLatin(measured from records)
차이Hangul(measured from records)

One other spelling is counted as the same name:

Locally spelled 차 in KR South Korea, MO Macao.

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)

tea, sometimes (dialect) specifically masala chai

Sources 1

  • kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

Attested across 10 languages in the etymology graph.

Where in the world(measured from records)

Cha 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.

Where Cha is recorded, by country
CountryMost common spellingSources
KR South Korea#35194,788as 차1 in 266206K차165
CN China—≈29,000 est.≈1 in 48K—Cha18
KP North Korea#123≈15,000 est.≈1 in 1.7K7Cha33
US United States—9,7321 in 34K10KCha214
MY Malaysia—≈3,400 est.≈1 in 9.7K—Cha17
MO Macao#80≈490 est.≈1 in 1.3K—차1
UY Uruguay—3711 in 9.1K371——

194,788 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 — Surname Frequency 2020; INE Uruguay — Apellidos más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public); 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).

Other names spelled this way(inferred from the name graph)

Cha is also recorded as 7 other names, grouped separately because the records behind them do not connect to the one described above.

  • Korean surname93 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in South Korea, United States, United Kingdom, Australia

    Languages: Korean, English, German

    Also written 채, Chae, Che, Ch'Ae, 체

  • Spanish surname56 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, Argentina, Mexico, Brazil

    Languages: Spanish, Portuguese

    Also written Chã, Chá, Ch-A, Chä, Chà

  • Chinese surname9 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in United States, China, Taiwan, Malaysia

    Also written Çhâ, Chà, Čhâ, Cha', Châ

  • a separate name5 spellings in the group

    Also written Chā, Chá, Chà, Chã

  • Hindi surname20 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in India, Pakistan, United States, Malaysia

    Languages: Hindi, Urdu

    Also written Chä, Chà, Ćhá, Čhå, Çhã

  • French surname51 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in France, United States, Belgium, Algeria

    Also written Cha', Chã, Chà, Châ, Çhà

  • Thai given name97 spellings in the group

    Most recorded in Thailand, India, United States, Malaysia

    Languages: Thai, Lao

    Also written Sai, ไทร, ไซ, Chai, ใส

69 further groups record this spelling and are not listed here.

Grouping is the name graph's, not a register's: two spellings join a group when the evidence links them, so a group is a claim about the records rather than about the people.

Other recorded senses(measured from records)

Cha 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 cdo, to grind the teeth, an auger, (attkchauk) char chat chat char chat chat

    as a wordDictionary of the Foochow Dialect

  • In sit-pro, love, be pleasant

    as a wordStarLing Tower of Babel etymological databases (Starostin et al.)

  • In sit-pro, top, above

    as a wordStarLing Tower of Babel etymological databases (Starostin et al.)

  • In Portuguese, "knowledge, ability and attitude", often cited together as desirable qualities in a work environment

    as a wordkaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations)

  • In Japanese, The hiragana syllable ちゃ (cha) or the katakana syllable チャ (cha) in Hepburn romanization.

    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)

19201940196019802000Jin Yong, b. 1924Cha Bum-kun, b. 1953Cha In-pyo, b. 1967Cha Tae-hyun, b. 1976Cha Du-ri, b. 1980Cha Soo-yeon, b. 1981Cha Jong-hyok, b. 1985Cha Ye-ryun, b. 1985N, b. 1990Baro, b. 1992
  • Jin Yongb. 1924CNnot in their usual nameHong Kong writer (1924-2018)
  • Cha Bum-kunb. 1953KRSouth Korean association football player
  • Cha In-pyob. 1967KRSouth Korean actor, director and writer
  • Cha Tae-hyunb. 1976KRSouth Korean actor, singer
  • Cha Du-rib. 1980KRSouth Korean footballer
  • Cha Soo-yeonb. 1981KRSouth Korean actress
  • Cha Jong-hyokb. 1985KPNorth Korean footballer
  • Cha Ye-ryunb. 1985KRSouth Korean actress
  • Nb. 1990KRnot in their usual nameSouth Korean singer
  • Barob. 1992KRnot in their usual nameSouth Korean actor, rapper 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).

Evidence(measured from records)

Attested in 39 sources across 25 countries.

Official registers attesting Cha
CountryRegisterYearCountRank
KR South KoreaKOSIS — 2015 census surnames2015206K#36
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 2020202010K#3,410
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 201020109.7K#3,654
US United StatesCensus Bureau — Surname Frequency 200020007.7K#4,258
UY UruguayINE Uruguay — Apellidos más frecuentes 1902–2024 (Tableau Public)—371—
KP North KoreaWikidata humans by citizenship — given & family names—7#30
US United Stateswru Name Dictionary — US surnames, Census 2010 subset (Khanna et al.)———

Reference works 4

  • The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland
  • Nederlandse FamilienamenBank (Dutch surname bank; ex-Meertens Instituut, now CBG)2007
  • Wikidata name items (native-script + romanized given/family names)
  • Cognomix.it (Nomix s.r.l.) — Italian surname origin dictionary

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 Cha mean, and where does it come from?
tea, sometimes (dialect) specifically masala chai Recorded by kaikki.org Wiktionary extract (IPA + transliterations).
What are other forms of the name Cha?
In the etymology graph, Chai is a form of the same name in other languages.
In which country does Cha have the most bearers?
In South Korea, the national register counted about 195 thousand people named 차, more than in any other country we hold.
How common is the name Cha?
In the United States, the national register counted 9,732 people named Cha in 2010, about 1 in 34 thousand residents.
How common is Cha compared with other names?
In South Korea, Cha is the 35th most common surname of 14,133 surnames recorded there.

What do you want to know about Cha?

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Query this name via API
curl -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY" https://api.mondonomo.ai/api/v1/name-graph/cha

The same 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), and bulk access is licensed separately.

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, “Cha” — the 35th most common surname in South Korea. Data snapshot 2026-10-10.

See how Cha parses inside a full name →