Language guide

Turkish Names: Meanings, Origins & Traditions

Turkish names are recorded here in the modern Turkish Latin alphabet, which replaced the Arabic-based Ottoman script in 1928. Because Ottoman Turkish absorbed a large Arabic and Persian vocabulary, many familiar Turkish names, such as Elif or Emir, go back to Arabic or Persian words, while others, such as Arslan or Aynur, contain native Turkic elements. Each entry states which of these applies, based on the cited sources.

Türkçe

Oghuz branch of the Turkic language family

Published names: 7961
Scripts in our data: Latin
ISO 639-1: tr

Browse Turkish names

7,961 names · page 326 of 332

Yücelen
“one who rises to eminence”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial
Yücelt
“raise up, exalt”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yücelten
“one who exalts”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yücenur
“lofty light”
From Turkic and Arabic · Turkish
Girl3 syllablesEditorial
Yücesan
“of high repute”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yücesoy
“of lofty, noble lineage”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy3 syllablesEditorial
Yücetekin
“exalted prince”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy4 syllablesEditorial
Yücetürk
“great, valued Turk”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex3 syllablesEditorial
Yüğrük
“swift, fast-running”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yüksel
“rise, ascend”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Yükselen
“rising, ascending”
From Turkic · Turkish
Girl3 syllablesEditorial
Yula
“torch”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yuluğ
“happy, fortunate; justice”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yülük
“respectful, bowing”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yumlu
“lucky, auspicious”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial

Yümnî
“lucky, auspicious”
From Arabic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Yümniye
“lucky, auspicious”
From Arabic · Turkish
Girl2 syllablesEditorial
Yumuk
“bud; gentle, quiet”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex2 syllablesEditorial
Yümun
“good fortune; abundance”
From Arabic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yumuş
“work, task”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial
Yunt
“horse; mare”
From Turkic · Turkish
Unisex1 syllableEditorial
Yunus
“Jonah (name of the prophet)”
From Hebrew · Turkish, Uyghur, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Azerbaijani, Turkmen, Tatar
Boy2 syllablesDocumented
Yunus Emre
“Jonah (dove) + Emre”
From Hebrew and Turkish · Turkish
Boy4 syllablesEditorial
Yura
“mountain ridge”
From Turkic · Turkish
Boy2 syllablesEditorial

How Turkish names are written

Modern Turkish uses a 29-letter Latin alphabet introduced in 1928. Letters such as ç, ğ, ı, İ, ö, ş and ü matter for spelling: Gülnur and Gulnur are different spellings, and the dotless ı is a separate letter from i. Search on this site ignores these marks, but entries always show the documented spelling.

Where Turkish names come from

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

Turkic
4158
Arabic
2170
Persian
1209
Greek
42
Mongolic
39
Hebrew
28
French
14

Counted from 7961 published entries. Each name page explains its own etymology with sources.

Turkish names by meaning

Turkish belongs to the Oghuz branch of the Turkic languages, together with Azerbaijani and Turkmen. Related languages share many words, but a name is listed under a language only when it is documented there.

Other languages: Uyghur · Kazakh · Kyrgyz · Uzbek · Tatar · Bashkir · Tajik

References for this page

Wikipedia contributors. Turkic languages. Wikimedia Foundation, revision 1377797900. Accessed 2026-10-28. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.
Wikipedia contributors. Turkish alphabet. Wikimedia Foundation, revision 1381762599. Accessed 2026-10-28. Licence: CC BY-SA 4.0.