List of common Chinese surnames in Singapore

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The following is a list of the most common Chinese surnames amongst the ethnic Chinese population in Singapore in the year 2000. Surnames are listed according to their romanised forms in different varieties of Spoken Chinese, hence similar surnames may be listed more than once despite representing the same Chinese character. For example, one single surname character, 陈 (Chén in Pinyin), is Tan in Hokkien and Chan in Cantonese, yet appears as two entries here. On the other hand, Wong can refer to the characters 王, 汪 or 黄 depending on the variety of Chinese, but are listed as a single entry. As Statistics Singapore notes, "Anglicised surnames have acquired their own unique connotative identity.[1]

Surname Number % of Chinese population
Written form[2] Chinese character Mandarin (pinyin)
Tan 陈 Chén 237,800 9.5
Lim 林 Lín 166,000 6.6
Lee 李 Lǐ 112,600 4.5
Ng 黄, 吴 or 伍 Huáng，Wú or Wŭ 106,200 4.2
Ong 王 or 汪 Wáng or Wāng 66,700 2.7
Wong 王, 汪 or 黄 Wáng, Wāng, or Huáng 65,000 2.6
Goh 吴 Wú 56,200 2.2
Chua 蔡 Cài 54,600 2.2
Chan 陈 or 曾 Chén or Zēng 48,400 1.9
Koh 许 Xǔ 48,100 1.9
Teo 张 Zhāng 46,800 1.9
Ang 洪 Hóng 43,600 1.7
Yeo 杨 Yáng 36,600 1.5
Tay 郑 Zhèng 35,800 1.4
Ho 何 Hé 35,000 1.4
Low 刘 Liú 31,600 1.3
Toh 杜 or 卓 Dù or Zhuō 25,300 1.0
Sim 沈 Shěn 23,800 0.9
Chong 庄 or 张 Zhuāng or Zhāng 23,100 0.9
Chia 谢 Xiè 22,600 0.9

[edit] Notes

  1. ^ "Popular Chinese Surnames in Singapore" web page at Statistics Singapore
  2. ^ Anglicised surname in Singapore based on pronunciation in the person's native version of spoken Chinese

[edit] References

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