Lei
雷 — Léi
The 80th most common surname in China
80th of the 100 commonest surnames in mainland China (Ministry of Public Security top-100 report, edition released January 2020 for 2019, as tabulated by English Wikipedia). Chinese Wikipedia puts modern Lei at about 0.25% of China's population, with roughly 56% of them living in Shaanxi, Sichuan, Hubei, Hunan, Guangdong and Guangxi; English Wikipedia notes it is not among the 100 most common surnames in Taiwan.
Where the name comes from
The character means 'thunder'. Chinese Wikipedia's main line makes the surname descend from a ninth-generation descendant of Shennong named Lei, who fought in the front rank for the Yellow Emperor against Chiyou and was enfeoffed at Fangshan; his descendants formed the compound clan name Fangleishi (方雷氏), which later split into the two surnames Lei and Fang. Other lines given are Lei Kai, a favourite of King Zhou of Shang; Leigong, a physician among the Yellow Emperor's ministers; and the Tushan Man (潳山蠻) of what is now Hubei, who took Lei as a Han surname in the late Han and the Wei–Jin period.
The same name, spelled differently
A Chinese surname is a character, not a spelling. The Latin letters on a passport come from whichever dialect the name was written down from — so these are all 雷.
- LeiMandarin — mainland China, Taiwan
- LuiCantonese — Hong Kong; also used by Hokkien, Teochew, Hakka and Hainanese speakers
- LoiCantonese — Macau
- LooiHokkien, Teochew, Hakka and Hainanese — Malaysia
- LouieTaishanese — United States
- LouiTaishanese
The character
Outside a name, 雷 is an ordinary word meaning thunder.
- Strokes
- 13
- Radical
- 雨
- As a word
- léi
Words built from 雷
The character does ordinary work in the language too. Each of these is a real word you can look up.