Meaning & origin
The story
Published U.S. birth records include this spelling as early as 2000. This is the earliest published observation available here, rather than a date for the name’s origin.
From dated birth records
Qian through the years
- Babies since 1880
- 20
- 20 boys · 0 girls
- Most popular year
- 2014
- 8 babies
- 2025
- 0
- Outside the ranked list
- 2021–25 vs 2016–20
- —
- Too few births to compare
By the numbers
The most recent published U.S. birth count for boys is 7 in 2015. Later missing counts do not mean the name went unused. Its largest published annual count for boys was 8 in 2014. Published U.S. population figures for this spelling include 3,825 as a first name in 2020; 5,191 as a surname in 2020.
From Social Security birth records and U.S. Census name counts for this exact spelling. Other spellings are counted separately.
Qian’s family of names
In English usage, Qian shares an earlier linguistic root with Chien. In Persian usage, Qian as a surname is a Roman-alphabet rendering of کیان.
Inner ring: spellings · outer: across languages.
Spellings & scripts 1
The same name written differently, including transliterations into other scripts.
Across languages 10
Equivalents and cognates in other languages, plus older forms it grew from.
- Jeonequivalent
- Chiendoublet · English
- 遷equivalent
- 전equivalent
- 虔equivalent
- Sinequivalent
- 前equivalent
- 茜equivalent
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People named Qian
- Li QianChinese boxerborn 1990
- Ren QianChinese diverborn 2001
- Janice WuChinese actressborn 1992
- Li QianChinese-Polish table tennis playerborn 1986
- Wan QianChinese actress and singerborn 1982
- Qin QianChinese judokaborn 1987
Listed by how widely each person is written about, which says nothing about the name itself.
Similar names
If you love Qian, these share its style, era, origin or sound, from outside its own family.
Kuan
Kuan is a surname from Mandarin, ultimately from Hokkien.
>99% boys
Tian
Tian is a surname from Mandarin. It is used in English and Tagalog.
94% boys · 6% girls
Chengyu
Chengyu is a surname from Chinese.
>99% boys
Liang
“a good man”
>99% boys
Xiang
“having a nice fragrance” · “one who soars above others”
>99% boys
Bin
Bin is a surname from Chinese.
>99% boys
Shuo
“one who achieves greatness”
>99% boys
Shen
“a spiritual man; one who is introspective”
>99% boys