73 most common 2 letter last names in the United States

In this section we'll look at the most common 2 letter last names in the United States. Currently, there are 965,858 people who have a last name that is 2 letters long.

These names are taken directly from the most recent 2010 Decennial Census data.

Most popular 2 letter last name

Currently, the most popular 2 letter last name in America is Li, with a total count of 111,786 people who have the surname. The surname Li occurs roughly 37 times per 100,000 people in the U.S.

There are only 73 last names that are 2 letters long. The table below shows all of them, along with the number of occurrences of each name.

Click any of the names in the table below to find out more about the origin, meaning, and ancestry of each last name.

Name Count White Black API AIAN 2+ Races Hispanic
Li 111,786 1.49% 0.19% 96.78% 0.02% 0.89% 0.63%
Le 110,967 1.49% 0.23% 95.59% 0.03% 1.92% 0.75%
Wu 71,721 1.37% 0.18% 96.37% 0.02% 1.59% 0.48%
Yu 52,035 1.46% 0.12% 96.10% 0.02% 1.61% 0.69%
Ho 49,817 2.42% 0.20% 93.06% 0.03% 3.21% 1.08%
Vo 36,236 1.40% 0.16% 96.07% 0.04% 1.72% 0.61%
Vu 36,179 1.04% (S) 96.61% (S) 1.68% 0.58%
Lu 35,628 1.77% 0.36% 95.74% 0.02% 1.43% 0.69%
Ng 31,210 1.92% 0.22% 93.20% 0.04% 2.81% 1.81%
Do 30,301 2.34% 0.37% 94.78% 0.02% 1.64% 0.86%
Ly 29,891 1.18% 1.54% 94.59% 0.03% 1.72% 0.95%
Ma 28,452 3.07% 0.45% 93.51% 0.06% 1.37% 1.54%
Xu 25,622 0.83% 0.12% 98.25% 0.02% 0.55% 0.24%
Hu 19,999 2.22% 0.37% 94.93% 0.04% 1.63% 0.81%
Oh 18,285 1.99% 0.19% 95.48% 0.05% 1.78% 0.51%
Ha 18,156 3.67% 0.69% 92.93% 0.04% 2.03% 0.63%
Yi 17,934 1.41% 0.18% 94.45% 0.03% 2.13% 1.80%
Lo 17,687 2.89% 2.17% 90.80% 0.06% 2.74% 1.33%
He 15,363 2.29% (S) 95.92% (S) 0.49% 0.97%
Ko 13,312 2.87% (S) 93.63% (S) 2.41% 0.85%
Su 12,973 2.26% (S) 93.36% (S) 2.00% 2.01%
Ye 9,839 1.33% (S) 97.02% (S) 0.84% 0.49%
Tu 9,230 1.95% (S) 94.03% (S) 2.26% 1.53%
To 8,934 1.96% (S) 95.06% (S) 1.37% 1.28%
Fu 8,370 2.19% (S) 94.06% (S) 2.00% 1.46%
An 8,160 3.37% 0.87% 92.99% 0.07% 1.42% 1.27%
Ta 8,017 2.46% 0.50% 94.29% 0.11% 1.76% 0.89%
Du 7,566 2.78% 0.81% 94.71% 0.07% 0.77% 0.87%
So 7,456 2.87% (S) 92.60% (S) 2.03% 1.84%
Au 7,148 8.38% (S) 83.07% (S) 5.69% 2.48%
La 6,655 6.00% 0.99% 88.91% 0.09% 1.76% 2.25%
Gu 5,532 2.64% (S) 94.78% (S) 0.45% 1.68%
Ku 4,888 3.76% (S) 85.31% (S) 3.54% 7.20%
Im 4,887 2.13% (S) 94.90% (S) 1.80% 0.88%
Ni 4,624 1.92% (S) 94.90% (S) 1.41% 1.15%
Sy 4,457 5.63% 19.07% 71.89% (S) 2.06% (S)
Go 4,370 6.18% (S) 86.61% (S) 3.55% 3.09%
Ou 4,196 2.24% (S) 95.61% (S) 1.36% 0.60%
Ji 4,039 1.66% (S) 96.91% (S) 0.74% 0.52%
Mo 3,983 7.48% 2.01% 85.79% 0.00% 2.16% 2.56%
Uy 3,633 2.84% (S) 91.33% (S) 3.17% 2.28%
Jo 3,588 6.80% 1.70% 85.23% 0.17% 1.67% 4.43%
Co 2,642 10.79% 3.18% 78.35% (S) (S) 4.50%
Qu 2,593 1.66% 0.27% 95.49% 0.00% 1.12% 1.47%
Ju 2,502 3.64% 0.48% 92.37% 0.00% 1.80% 1.72%
Ro 2,455 12.30% (S) 78.21% (S) 2.53% 5.09%
Ba 2,451 14.12% 65.44% 12.73% (S) (S) 4.81%
Qi 2,354 1.36% (S) 97.62% (S) 0.76% 0.21%
Re 2,214 82.57% 4.70% 2.21% 0.50% 1.13% 8.90%
Ip 2,057 2.38% (S) 94.70% (S) 2.09% 0.73%
Dy 1,932 4.19% (S) 88.82% (S) 3.16% 2.54%
Ge 1,917 5.95% 1.41% 91.44% 0.00% 0.42% 0.78%
Ke 1,890 8.94% (S) 84.76% (S) 3.23% 1.59%
Ek 1,882 65.46% 1.22% 15.57% (S) (S) 16.68%
Mu 1,803 5.88% 1.72% 88.74% (S) (S) 2.16%
Um 1,607 1.80% 0.50% 95.08% 0.00% 1.74% 0.87%
Oo 1,601 3.00% (S) 92.88% (S) 2.56% 0.87%
Sa 1,600 45.13% 3.75% 37.88% 0.31% 3.19% 9.75%
El 1,597 13.15% 60.93% 16.47% 1.19% 5.13% 3.13%
In 1,492 4.02% 0.34% 91.35% 0.00% 1.88% 2.41%
Ra 1,458 13.44% 6.24% 72.50% (S) (S) 5.01%
Bi 1,438 5.15% 1.46% 90.75% (S) 1.32% (S)
No 1,349 14.68% 2.00% 78.80% (S) (S) 3.11%
Bo 1,348 33.83% 4.45% 55.64% (S) (S) 4.23%
On 1,309 8.10% 2.14% 85.18% 0.00% 2.22% 2.37%
Pu 1,299 4.39% (S) 75.98% (S) 3.39% 14.93%
Te 1,246 5.54% (S) 87.72% (S) 2.65% 2.65%
Po 1,213 10.47% (S) 80.38% (S) 2.31% 5.36%
Si 1,166 8.92% 3.00% 84.91% (S) (S) 2.14%
Be 1,146 22.69% 4.89% 60.82% 0.52% 2.44% 8.64%
de 1,123 26.54% 3.92% 56.81% (S) (S) 10.42%
Ky 1,042 2.02% 2.78% 92.13% (S) 2.02% (S)
Pi 1,006 11.93% 2.09% 64.61% 0.00% 2.09% 19.28%

Last names by length

Our database contains names ranging in length from 2 to 15 letters. To find out more information about last names of different lengths you can use the following links:

Last names by letter

To find all of the most popular last names by starting letter, you can choose a letter from the following list:

Last names by ancestry and letter

If you want to get even more specific, we also have pages that will let you find last names beginning with A (or any other letter) based on a specific ancestry.

(You must really be into last names to get this far down the page!)

The links below will let you research white last names starting with each letter of the alphabet.

The links below will let you research black last names starting with each letter of the alphabet.

The links below will let you research Hispanic last names starting with each letter of the alphabet.

The links below will let you research Asian and Pacific Islander last names starting with each letter of the alphabet.

The links below will let you research American Indian and Alaskan Native last names starting with each letter of the alphabet.

Data source

The last name data and ethnic breakdown of last names is sourced directly from the Decennial Census survey, conducted every 10 years by the United States Census Bureau.

The history and meaning of last names was researched and written by our team of onomatology and genealogy experts.

If you have a correction or suggestion to improve our data, please contact us.

Reference this page

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If you found the data or information on this page useful in your research, please use the tool below to properly cite or reference Name Census as the source. We appreciate your support!

"73 most common 2 letter last names in the United States". NameCensus.com. Accessed on November 22, 2024. http://namecensus.com/last-names/2-letter-last-names/.

"73 most common 2 letter last names in the United States". NameCensus.com, http://namecensus.com/last-names/2-letter-last-names/. Accessed 22 November, 2024

73 most common 2 letter last names in the United States. NameCensus.com. Retrieved from http://namecensus.com/last-names/2-letter-last-names/.

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