[2] Chen is also the most common family name in Guangdong, Zhejiang, Fujian, Macau, and Hong Kong.

[3] Chen was listed 10th in the Hundred Family Surnames poem, in the verse 馮陳褚衛 (Féng Chén Chǔ Wèi).

Chen descends from the legendary sage king Emperor Shun from around 2200 BC via the surname Gui (媯).

[9][10] A millennium after Emperor Shun, when King Wu of Zhou established the Zhou dynasty (c. 1046 BC), he enfeoffed his son-in-law Gui Man, also known as Duke Hu of Chen or Chen Hugong (陈胡公).

[9][10] At the end of the Qin dynasty, Chen Sheng initiated the Chen Sheng Wu Guang uprising that overthrew the Qin and paved the way for the Han dynasty, one of China's golden ages.

[13][14][15] During this period, the nomadic Xianbei people had systematically assimilated into China's agrarian culture and adopted Han Chinese surnames under the state directives of Emperor Xiaowen of Northern Wei.

Their original home was Fujian, and they migrated under Trần Kinh (陳京 Chén Jīng).

Trần Thái Tông (陈太宗 Chen Taizong) became the founding emperor of the Tran dynasty, and his descendants would rule Vietnam for more than a century, expanding Vietnam's territory and promoting developments in language, chu nom, culture, and art.

Certain members of the clan could still speak Chinese, like when a Yuan dynasty envoy had a meeting with the Chinese-speaking Tran Prince Trần Quốc Tuấn in 1282.

A 2013 study found that it was the 5th most common surname, shared by 61,300,000 people or 4.610% of the population, with the province with the most being Guangdong.