Do Muslim women change their last name when they marry?

Many Muslim brides wonder whether they should keep their name or take their husband’s, and some have heard that changing it is haram. Muslim women have traditionally kept their own names after marriage. The women of the Prophet’s ﷺ household were known by their fathers’ names all their lives, and in much of the Muslim world a woman’s legal name still does not change when she marries. At the same time, Islamic law sets no rule on surnames. Taking a husband’s family name, keeping one’s own, or joining the two are all halal, and the choice is the woman’s.

Did the women of the Prophet’s ﷺ time change their names?

They did not, because Arabia had no family surnames to change. A person was known by their own name and their father’s: Khadīja bint Khuwaylid, Aisha bint Abī Bakr, Fāṭima bint Muḥammad. A woman carried her father’s name (nasab, نسب) into her marriage and kept it, just as she kept her own mahr and property (What is mahr?). Women were also known by a kunya, such as Umm Salama, “mother of Salama.”

Women were sometimes identified by their husbands as well. Abu Saʿīd al-Khudrī reported that after an Eid sermon a woman asked to see the Prophet ﷺ:

«هَذِهِ زَيْنَبُ فَقَالَ أَىُّ الزَّيَانِبِ فَقِيلَ امْرَأَةُ ابْنِ مَسْعُودٍ»

“‘This is Zaynab.’ He asked, ‘Which Zaynab?’ He was told, ‘The wife of Ibn Masʿūd.’”

Sahih al-Bukhari 1462

He welcomed her in, and she asked about giving her own jewelry in charity. To be known through one’s spouse was normal and honorable.

What does the Quran say about names and lineage?

The Quran names women both ways. Near the end of Sūrat al-Taḥrīm it holds up two women as examples for all believers:

وَضَرَبَ ٱللَّهُ مَثَلٗا لِّلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُواْ ٱمۡرَأَتَ فِرۡعَوۡنَ

“Allah sets forth as an example for those who believe the wife of Pharaoh.”

Quran 66:11

The very next verse adds “and Mary, the daughter of ʿImrān” (66:12). One woman is named through her husband and the other through her father. The Quran’s concern is lineage (nasab), the truth about who a person’s parents are. In Sūrat al-Aḥzāb it tells the believers to stop calling adopted sons by their adoptive fathers’ names: “Call them by their fathers; that is more just in the sight of Allah” (Quran 33:5). The verse came when Zayd, whom the Prophet ﷺ had adopted and who was known as “Zayd son of Muhammad,” was returned to his true name, Zayd ibn Ḥāritha.

Is it haram to take your husband’s last name?

Some contemporary scholars have held that it is, reading it as a claim of false descent. They cite 33:5 and the hadith “Whoever claims to be the son of someone other than his father, knowing he is not his father, Paradise is forbidden to him” (Sahih al-Bukhari 6766).

The stronger view is that it is permissible. A modern surname marks the household a person belongs to; it makes no claim about who her father is. When a woman becomes Mrs. Khan, no one believes she is Mr. Khan’s daughter. Islamic law reads words by the meaning people give them in their custom (ʿurf, عرف), and one of its five great maxims is that “matters are judged by their purposes” (al-umūr bi-maqāṣidihā). A wife who takes her husband’s family name intends to share a household, a name for her children, and a common identity, and her lineage stays exactly what it was. The hadith on false lineage concerns a person who denies their own father, which a married woman’s surname never does.

What do Muslim women do around the world?

Practice varies with local custom. In most Arab countries and in Iran, a woman’s legal name stays the same after marriage. In Malaysia, many Muslims carry no family surname at all, only their own name joined to their father’s with bin or binti, and most Indonesians have no family name either. In Turkey, in South Asia, and among Muslims in Europe and North America, many women take their husband’s family name, keep their own, or join the two. Each of these customs is Muslim, and none is more Islamic than the others.

How should a Muslim woman decide?

Weigh what matters to you and talk it over with your husband before the wedding (What happens at a Muslim wedding?):

• Your heritage. Keeping your father’s name honors your family and follows the oldest Muslim practice.
• Your household. A shared name can express unity and match your children’s names.
• Your work and records. A professional name, published work, or documents may make keeping your name easier.
• Your freedom. Neither husband nor family should pressure you. Your name is part of your dignity (karāma).

The same freedom applies to children’s names within the bounds of true lineage, explained in Can Muslims adopt?, and to converts who wonder about their own names (Do converts have to change their name?).

A closing word

Allah made human beings into peoples and tribes for a purpose:

وَجَعَلۡنَٰكُمۡ شُعُوبٗا وَقَبَآئِلَ لِتَعَارَفُوٓاْ

“And We made you peoples and tribes so that you may know one another.”

Quran 49:13

Names exist so that people may know one another. Whatever name a Muslim woman carries, the same verse reminds her that “the noblest of you in the sight of Allah is the most mindful of Him.” May Allah bless every marriage with love, and every name with honor.