Language guide

Kazakh Names: Meanings, Origins & Traditions

Kazakh names are listed here in Kazakh Cyrillic, the alphabet used in Kazakhstan, together with any Latin spelling that our sources record. Many Kazakh names are compounds of native words, such as ай 'moon' or жан 'soul', and others come from Arabic and Persian. Kazakhstan has decided to move from Cyrillic to a Latin alphabet, a transition now scheduled to finish by 2031, so Latin spellings of the same name can still vary.

Қазақ тілі

Kipchak branch of the Turkic language family

Published names: 1555
Scripts in our data: Cyrillic, Latin
ISO 639-1: kk

Browse Kazakh names

1,059 names · page 40 of 45

Yerzhigit
“brave young man”
From Proto-Turkic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yeskendir
“defender of men”
From Greek · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yessen
“healthy, safe and sound”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yessenai
“safe; peaceful + moon”
Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesLikely
Yessenaman
“safe and sound”
From Turkic and Arabic · Kazakh
Boy4 syllablesEditorial
Yessenbai
“healthy and rich”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yessenkan
“safe; peaceful + khan (ruler over various Turkic and Mongol peoples in the Middle Ages)”
Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesLikely
Yessenmurat
“safe; peaceful + cherished goal”
Kazakh
Boy4 syllablesLikely
Yessentemir
“safe; peaceful + iron”
Kazakh
Boy4 syllablesLikely
Yessenzhan
“healthy soul”
From Turkic and Persian · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yessenzhol
“safe road”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yessil
“the Ishim river”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yessim
“name”
From Classical Persian · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesLikely
Yessimkhan
“name + khan (ruler over various Turkic and Mongol peoples in the Middle Ages)”
From Classical Persian and Kipchak · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesDocumented
Ykylas
“zeal, sincere devotion”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial

Yntymak
“unity, solidarity”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yntyzar
“longing, eager”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yrym
“superstition, belief”
From Proto-Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesLikely
Yrys
“luck, happiness”
From Turkic · Kazakh, Kyrgyz
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Yrysbek
“wealth, prosperity, abundance; happiness, luck, fortune + bey, beg, bek, master (component of many male given names)”
From Arabic and Proto-Turkic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesLikely
Yryskeldi
“fortune has come”
From Turkic · Kazakh, Kyrgyz
Boy4 syllablesEditorial
Yryssaldy
“received fortune”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Unisex4 syllablesEditorial
Yryszhan
“soul of fortune”
From Arabic and Classical Persian · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yskak
“he laughs”
From Hebrew · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial

How Kazakh names are written

Kazakh Cyrillic adds letters such as ә, ғ, қ, ң, ө, ұ, ү, һ and і to the Russian alphabet. A 2017 decree started a move to Latin script, later pushed back to 2031. Kazakhs in China, Iran and Afghanistan use an Arabic-based script. Latin forms on this site are shown only where a source records them.

Where Kazakh names come from

A name used in Kazakh is not automatically Kazakh in origin. Here is how the documented origins of the Kazakh names published so far break down (a name with elements from two languages counts under both):

Turkic
722
Arabic
557
Persian
448
Kipchak
65
Hebrew
26
Greek
17
Mongolic
15

Counted from 1555 published entries. Each name page explains its own etymology with sources.

Kazakh names by meaning

Kazakh belongs to the Kipchak branch of the Turkic languages, together with Kyrgyz, Tatar and Bashkir. Related languages share many words, but a name is listed under a language only when it is documented there.

Other languages: Turkish · Uyghur · Uzbek · Azerbaijani · Turkmen · Tajik

References for this page

Wikipedia contributors. Kazakh alphabets. Wikimedia Foundation, revision 1381145820. Accessed 2026-10-28. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
Wikipedia contributors. Turkic languages. Wikimedia Foundation, revision 1377797900. Accessed 2026-10-28. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.