Meaning of the surname Chan
Chan is a Maya surname of the indigenous type meaning "small". It is a regional surname. The most common Maya surname, carried by some 70,000 people in Yucatán; also among the top 10 surnames in the state as a whole. Chinese Chan is unrelated.
Maya surnames from Yucatán and Campeche (Pech, Canul, Chan, Ek, May, Uc, Poot, Tun) and Nahuatl surnames from central Mexico. Yucatán is the one region of Mexico where indigenous surnames dominate the top of the list.
In Mexico a person carries two surnames, the father's and then the mother's, so Chan appears as either half of a pair: Chan García, López Chan. Read how the two-surname system works.