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

76 names · page 1 of 4

Kabyl
“acceptance”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Kadyr
“powerful; esteemed”
From Arabic · Kazakh, Kyrgyz
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Kadyrbek
“powerful lord”
From Arabic and Turkic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Kairat
“zeal, vigour; sense of honour”
From Arabic (via Persian) · Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Kaisar
“persistent, steadfast”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Kaiyr
“goodness, charity”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy1 syllableEditorial
Kaiyrbek
“charity + bey, beg, bek, master”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Kaiyrly
“auspicious, good”
From Arabic and Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Kakharman
“hero”
From Persian · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Kalamkas
“with finely drawn eyebrows”
From Arabic and Turkic · Kazakh
Girl3 syllablesEditorial
Kalampyr
“carnation”
From Greek · Kazakh
Girl3 syllablesEditorial
Kalau
“wish, desire”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Kalipa
“successor”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Girl3 syllablesDocumented
Kamal
“perfection”
From Arabic · Kazakh, Azerbaijani, Tatar, Bashkir
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Kamar
“moon”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial

Kamarnissa
“moon among women”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Girl4 syllablesEditorial
Kamka
“brocade”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Kamys
“reed”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Kanagat
“contentment, satisfaction”
From Arabic · Kazakh
Unisex3 syllablesDocumented
Kanat
“wing”
From Proto-Turkic · Turkish, Kazakh, Kyrgyz
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Kapar
“mind; spirit”
From Turkic · Turkish, Kazakh
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Karabala
“black; large, big, great + child”
From Proto-Turkic · Kazakh
Unisex4 syllablesLikely
Karabek
“black + bey, beg, bek, master”
From Proto-Turkic · Kazakh
Boy3 syllablesDocumented
Karagoz
“dark-eyed”
From Turkic · Kazakh
Girl3 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.