20 Most Famous Danish people

20 Most Famous Danish People

Originally Lilian on January 2021 and Updated by Vanessa R on May 2023. Updated  by Ruth in March 2024

Denmark is without a doubt one of the world’s top countries. Going by the extent of its beautiful people and innovations, it is not hard to tell why it is so.

This country was the land of the Vikings. Today, it is one of the countries with the most progressive politics, architecture and free education.

The Danish are also said to be the happiest people in the world. They have impacted the world in so many ways through their contributions.

There are excellent Danish football players, actors, inventors, scientists, and so many more. Today I will share with you the 20 most famous Danish people.

1. Vitus Bering – Explorer and Cartographer

Vitus Bering – Wikimedia

Vitus was an explorer with the most famous surname in the world. He joined the Russian Navy in 1703 but he was born in the happy harbour hamlet of Horsens.

Bering loved to travel and so he left his hometown as a young man and set about ship business. He explored northern Siberia for over a decade.

During his expeditions, he stumbled upon Alaska. The land in that region was named after him such as the Bering Strait, the Bering Sea, Bering Island, Bering Glacier and the Bering Land Bridge.

A University in Horsens has been named after him.

2. Karen Blixen – Author

Karen Blixen By SAS Scandinavian Airlines – Wikimedia

She may have lived most of her adult life in Kenya, but Karen Blixen was born in Copenhagen. In 1913, Karen left her home country and moved to Kenya where she married a distant cousin who was a baron.

Blixen started writing after moving to Kenya telling of the beautiful adventures she encountered. Her best-seller which was turned into a movie was the book Out of Africa.

She lived in the leafy suburbs of Nairobi, Karen. Her home is now a museum. Blixen was considered several times for the Nobel Prize in Literature.

3. Prince Philip – Duke of Edinburgh

Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh By Allan warren – Wikimedia

Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh, is the husband of Queen Elizabeth II. He was born Prince Philip of Greece and Denmark.

He joined the navy in 1938 and served during the ‘Second World War.’ His family connections got him access to the British royal family. He got engaged to Princess Elizabeth, who later became the queen.

Prince Philip had to relinquish his Danish and Greek royal title. While he was engaged to Princess Elizabeth, he was named as the Earl of Merioneth, Baron Greenwich, and Duke of Edinburgh.

The Duke of Edinburg has been active in serving as the royal consort of the UK and the other Commonwealth realms. He holds honorary memberships in the Rotary clubs of Edinburgh, Scotland, and King’s Lynn, England.

Prince Philip is the chairman of ‘The Duke of Edinburgh’s Award’ for people aged 14 to 24.

4. Nikolaj Coster-Waldau – Actor/Producer

Nikolaj Coster-Waldau – by Wikimedia

You probably recognize him from the epic series Game of Thrones as Ser Jaime Lannister. Nikolaj is an actor, screenwriter, and producer.

He is also known for his roles in several movies, such as Nightwatch, A Thousand Times Good Night and Head hunters.

Other than being an actor, Nikolaj is active in several humanitarian causes and supports the Danish Red Cross. He is the UNDP Goodwill Ambassador and supports the Sustainable Development Goals of the United Nations.

His most recent films roles include Gods of Egypt and Small Crimes in 2016 and Shot Caller in 2017.

5. Giancarlo Esposito – Actor

Giancarlo Esposito By Gage Skidmore – Wikimedia

Giancarlo Giuseppe Alessandro Esposito is an actor and filmmaker from America. He, however, has his roots in Copenhagen.

Esposito moved to the United States when he was six years old. He studied at Elizabeth Seton College in New York and graduated with a degree in radio and television communications.

Giancarlo started his acting career at the age of eight in a Broadway production of ‘Maggie Flynn’. His big-screen debut was in 1979 in a sports drama called Running.

Esposito’s most famous role was in the television series Breaking Bad. He played Gus Fring, a powerful drug lord. This role earned him the Best Supporting Actor in a Drama award at the 2012 Critics’ Choice Television Awards.

6. Caroline Wozniacki

Andrew Campbell, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Tennis player Caroline Wozniacki is a professional from Denmark. She was formerly ranked first in the world on the WTA Tour. She had held this post for 67 weeks as of January 23, 2012. She held the top spot and finished 20th overall, being the first woman from Scandinavia to do so.

Since making her WTA debut in 2005, she has risen in the year-end rankings, winning the championship in both 2010 and 2011. As of October 2012, Wozniacki had won 20 WTA singles titles, including three in 2008, three in 2009, six in 2010, six in 2011, and two in 2012. She finished second to Kim Clijsters in both the 2009 US Open and the 2010 WTA Tour Championships in Doha.

7. Søren Kierkegaard

Søren Aabye Kierkegaard was a Danish philosopher, theologian, poet, social critic, and religious author who is regarded as the father of existential philosophy. With an affinity for metaphor, irony, and parables, he published critical books on organised religion, Christendom, morality, ethics, psychology, and religious philosophy.

His philosophical writings usually address the difficulties of living as a “single individual,” prioritising realistic human experience over abstract ideas and stressing the significance of individual responsibility and choice. He was a harsh opponent of the idealist thinkers and intellectuals of his day, including Swedenborg, Hegel, Goethe, Fichte, Schelling, Schlegel, and Hans Christian Andersen.

8. Hans Christian Andersen

 Hans Christian Andersen was a poet and writer from Denmark. Andersen was a prolific writer of plays, travelogues, novels, and poems, but his fairy tales are what people most commonly associate him with. Andersen’s tales, known as eventyr, or “fairy tales,” deal with issues that cut across age and nationality, making them appealing to adults as well as children.

Andersen’s fairy tales, which have been translated into more than 125 languages, are widely available to kids while also imparting lessons in morality and resiliency in the face of hardship to readers of all ages. They have served as the basis for plays, ballets, and live-action and animated movies.

9. Lars von Trier

Siebbi, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Danish director and screenwriter Lars von Trier produces films. Although his own films have adopted a variety of styles, he is closely associated with the Dogme 95 collective, a groundbreaking filmmaking movement. The reviews of his work have regularly divided critics. At the age of eleven, Von Trier started making films. In addition to having a number of phobias and fears, including a severe dread of flying, Von Trier experiences episodes of despair.

He joked in an interview that “basically, I’m afraid of everything in life, except filmmaking.” The Orchid Gardener, an experimental short he made for the public for the first time, and The Element of Crime, the first of his feature, arrived seven years later. He has received the Palme d’Or, among many other honours and nominations.

10. Niels Henrik David Bohr

Danish physicist Niels Henrik David Bohr is recognised with the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922 for his fundamental contributions to the study of quantum theory and atomic structure. In addition to being a scientist, Bohr was a philosopher and an advocate for it. Bohr created the Bohr model of the atom, in which he argued that electron energy levels are discrete, that they orbit the atomic nucleus in stable orbits, but that they are capable of hopping from one energy level to another.

The essential ideas of the Bohr model are still applicable even though other models have taken their place. He proposed the complementarity principle, which states that objects can be studied individually in terms of seemingly incompatible characteristics, such as whether they behave as a wave or a stream of particles.

11. Lars Ulrich

Ralph Arvesen, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

American-Danish drummer Lars Ulrich is one of the original members of the American heavy metal group Metallica. His family was upper middle class and he was born in Gentofte, Denmark.

Ulrich, who had previously played tennis, relocated to Los Angeles, California at the age of sixteen in the summer of 1980 to continue his training, but he soon started playing the drums instead of tennis. Ulrich and James Hetfield met as a result of an advertisement he placed in The Recycler, a neighbourhood publication in Los Angeles.

12. Christian Eriksen

Danish-born Christian Dannemann Eriksen is a midfielder for Tottenham Hotspur in the English Premier League. He made his debut for the Danish national team in March 2010 and was the youngest player at the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa. Eriksen won the titles of Danish Football Player of the Year, Dutch Football Talent of the Year, Ajax Talent of the Year, and member of the UEFA Euro U-21 Team of the Tournament in 2011. Before joining Tottenham Hotspur in August 2013, he won the Eredivisie with Ajax in 2010–11, 2011–12, and 2012–13.

13. Allan Simonsen

David Merrett, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Allan Rodenkam Simonsen is the former manager and player for the Danish national team, He is best known for his time spent playing for the Spanish club Barcelona and the German Bundesliga team Borussia Mönchengladbach, both of which won UEFA Cups in 1975 and 1979.

The only player in football history to score in the Cup Winners’ Cup, UEFA Cup, and European Cup finals is Simonsen. While playing for Mönchengladbach, Simonsen won the 1977 European Footballer of the Year award. Simonsen played 55 times and scored 20 goals for Denmark’s national football team. He competed for Denmark at the 1972 Summer Olympics, the 1984 European Championship, and the 1986 World Cup. In November 2008, he was elected into the Danish Football Hall of Fame.

14. Giancarlo Esposito

The actor, director, and producer Giancarlo Giuseppe Alessandro Esposito is American. In 2012, he was nominated for an Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series award at the Primetime Emmy Awards and won the Critics’ Choice Television Award for Best Supporting Actor in a Drama for his portrayal of Gustavo “Gus” Fring on the AMC series Breaking Bad.

He is best known for this role. His performances in films like King of New York, The Usual Suspects, and Do the Right Thing have made him well renowned. His current role in the NBC series Revolution is that of Major Tom Neville.

15. Tom Kristensen

Audi Communications Motorsport / Ferdi Kräling Motorsport-Bild GmbH, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Tom Kristensen is a racecar driver from Denmark. Although he has won numerous championships in auto racing, his most notable accomplishment is being the only person to have captured the desired 24 Hours of Le Mans nine times, six of which were consecutive.

After being a late addition to the squad following Davy Jones’ accident that ultimately disqualified him from the race, he won the race in 1997 with the Joest Racing team, driving a Tom Walkinshaw Racing-designed and Porsche-powered WSC95. With the exception of 2003, when he drove a Bentley prototype, all of his victories since then have been achieved while driving an Audi prototype. In the final stages of the race in both 1999 and 2007, Kristensen’s team crashed out of a commanding lead.

16. Niels Bohr

Niels Bohr, a Danish physicist, made groundbreaking contributions to the understanding of atomic structure and quantum mechanics. Awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1922, Bohr’s model of the atom, with electrons in distinct orbits, was pivotal. He played a crucial role during World War II, aiding Allied efforts. Bohr’s influence extended through his Copenhagen Institute, fostering scientific collaboration. His legacy endures in the Bohr model and the Bohr magneton, reflecting his profound impact on physics.

17. Viggo Mortensen

Ministerio de Cultura de la Nación, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Viggo Mortensen, a Danish-American actor, poet, and painter, gained global acclaim for portraying Aragorn in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. Born in New York to a Danish father, Mortensen’s diverse filmography includes A History of Violence and Eastern Promises. Beyond acting, he’s a published poet, photographer, and musician. Mortensen’s multidimensional artistry, coupled with his multilingualism, exemplifies his cultural richness.

18. Mads Mikkelsen

Mads Mikkelsen, a Danish actor, has earned international acclaim for his versatile roles. Known for his compelling performances in Casino Royale, The Hunt, and as Hannibal Lecter in the TV series Hannibal, Mikkelsen embodies depth and charisma. His nuanced portrayals, often oscillating between antagonist and protagonist, showcase his acting prowess. Mikkelsen’s impact on both European and Hollywood cinema solidifies him as a cinematic force.

19. Nina Agdal

Arturo Pardavila III from Hoboken, NJ, USA, CC BY 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Nina Agdal, a Danish model, rose to prominence through her appearances in Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue and collaborations with renowned brands. Born in Denmark, Agdal’s modelling career catapulted globally, featuring in prominent fashion publications. Beyond modelling, she advocates for body positivity and mental health awareness, reflecting a commitment to broader societal discussions. Agdal’s impact extends beyond the runway, contributing to contemporary dialogues on beauty standards.

20. Connie Nielsen

Connie Nielsen, a Danish actress, has garnered acclaim for her roles in both European and Hollywood cinema. Notable for her performances in Gladiator, The Devil’s Advocate, and Wonder Woman, Nielsen’s talent transcends genres. Born in Denmark, her international career showcases versatility. Beyond acting, Nielsen engages in philanthropy, aligning with her commitment to humanitarian causes. Nielsen’s cinematic prowess, coupled with her advocacy efforts, underscores her influential presence in the entertainment industry.