Surname ranking in Belgium

This ranking lists the 600 most common surnames in Belgium, ordered by the number of families that bear them. For each surname you will find its rank, the surname and the number of families; click a name to open the map of its distribution.

First place goes to Peeters, with 12,987 families, ahead of Janssens (12,265) and Maes (9,939).

Almost all the top names are Flemish patronymics: Peeters, Janssens, Jacobs, Willems and Mertens go back to the given names Pieter, Jan, Jacob, Willem and Merten, while Maes and Claes are short forms of Thomas and Nicolaas. French-speaking names from Wallonia and Brussels appear further down, such as Dubois (15th) and Dupont (25th). The same name is often counted in several spellings, such as De Smet, Desmet and Smets, or De Vos and Devos. Read more on the Surname history page.

On this page: ranks 401 to 500, from Dewitte (918 families) to Sanders (785 families).