The surname Knowles
An English place surname, carried by 28,460 people in the United States.
Pronounced /noʊlz/ 1 syllable Soundex K542
Origin
English origin
Topographic surname for someone who lived at the top of a hill, from a genitive or plural form of Middle English knol (“hilltop, hillock”).
Knowles is a place surname: taken from where an ancestor lived or came from.
One of 1,446 English surnames on this site.
Origin from Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0).
How common it is
2010 US Census
There were 28,460 people named Knowles in the United States in 2010, about 1 in every 10,848 Americans. That is up 3.9% since 2000, when the Census counted 27,380.
Who is named Knowles
Race and Hispanic origin as people reported it in the 2010 Census
81% of people named Knowles identified as white (not Hispanic), 13% as Black (not Hispanic) and 2.7% as Hispanic or Latino (any race).
- White (not Hispanic) 81%
- Black (not Hispanic) 13%
- Hispanic or Latino (any race) 2.7%
- Two or more races 1.9%
- American Indian and Alaska Native 0.6%
- Asian and Pacific Islander 0.6%
Famous Knowless
17 notable people on Wikidata, most written-about first
- William Standish KnowlesAmerican chemist (1917–2012)
- Solange KnowlesAmerican singer, songwriter, and actress (born 1986)
- Mark KnowlesBahamian tennis player, born 1971
- Tina KnowlesAmerican businesswoman and fashion designer, mother of Beyoncé and Solange Knowles, born 1954
- Durward KnowlesBritish-Bahamian sailor, 1917–2018
- Carl KnowlesAmerican basketball player (1910-1981)
- Mark KnowlesAustralian field hockey player, born 1984
- Mathew KnowlesAmerican music executive, businessman, record producer, and manager, born 1952
- Patric KnowlesActor, novelist, 1911–1995
- Malcolm KnowlesAdult educator (1913–1997)
- Shanica KnowlesAmerican actress and singer, born 1990
- Alison KnowlesAmerican mixed-media and performance artist (born 1933-2025)
Notable Knowless come mostly from the United States (13), The Bahamas (2) and Australia (1).
Spellings and sound-alikes
Useful when a record has your ancestor under another spelling
Variant spellings
- Knoles
- Knollys
- Noles
Knowles has the Soundex code K542, the code US census indexes have used since the 1930s. Every surname with code K542.
Other English surnames
Questions
- Where does the surname Knowles come from?
- Topographic surname for someone who lived at the top of a hill, from a genitive or plural form of Middle English knol (“hilltop, hillock”).
- How common is the surname Knowles?
- 28,460 people in the United States had the surname Knowles in the 2010 Census, about 1 in every 10,848 Americans. It ranked 1,239th of 162,253 surnames.
- What ethnicity is the surname Knowles?
- In the 2010 Census, 81% of people named Knowles identified as white (not Hispanic), and 13% as Black (not Hispanic).
- Who is the most famous person named Knowles?
- William Standish Knowles, American chemist (1917–2012), followed by Solange Knowles.
- Where is the surname Knowles most common?
- Wikidata records people named Knowles in the United States, The Bahamas and Australia and 1 other country.
- How do you pronounce Knowles?
- Knowles is /noʊlz/, one syllable.
- What type of surname is Knowles?
- Knowles is a place surname, taken from where an ancestor lived or came from.
- Is the surname Knowles getting more or less common?
- More common. 27,380 people carried it in the 2000 Census and 28,460 in 2010, up 3.9%.
- What are other spellings of Knowles?
- Knoles, Knollys and Noles.