Many people converted to Islam from a different religion or no religion. The list is categorized alphabetically with their former religious affiliation, where known.
According to The New York Times, 25,000 Americans convert to Islam every year. According to The Guardian, about 5,000 British people convert to Islam every year, mostly women. According to The Jerusalem Post, in the United Kingdom and France, up to 100,000 people converted in the last decade in each country.Lefkovits, Etgar (23 January 2007). "Islam converts change face of Europe", The Jerusalem Post. Retrieved 1 February 2013. Archived 13 April 2014. According to the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Dawah and Guidance, 347,646 people converted to Islam in Saudi Arabia between 2019 and 2023.
Alphabetical order by last name
A Johari Abdul-Malik – He served as the first officially recognized Muslim chaplain in higher education in the United States. Ali ibn Sahl Rabban al-Tabari – Persian scholar, physician and psychologist, who produced one of the first Islamic encyclopedia of medicine titled Firdaws al-Hikmah ("Paradise of Wisdom").He first discovered that pulmonary tuberculosis is contagious. Ruslan Maratovich Asainov – Naturalized U.S. citizen who left his family and joined the Islamic State in Syria. Fakhr al-Din al-Qibti – Egyptian Supervisor of the armies in the Mamluk Sultanate. Tariq Abdul-Wahad – French basketball coach and former player. Sanad ibn Ali – Astronomer, translator, mathematician and engineer during Islamic Golden Age who was employed at the court of the Abbasid caliph Al-Ma'mun. Zaid Abdul-Aziz – American former professional basketball player. Herman Abanda – Cameroonian former footballer who played as a defender. Aminah Assilmi (born Janice Huff) – Former Southern Baptist preacher who converted to Islam while attempting to convert Muslims to Christianity. Khaydhar ibn Kawus al-Afshin – Senior general of Sogdian descent at the court of the Abbasid caliphs and a vassal prince of Oshrusana. Amber Leibrock – American female mixed martial artist, converted to Islam in September 2023. Tamim al-Dari – Companion of Muhammad and an early convert from Christianity to Islam. Al-Samawal al-Maghribi – Mathematician, astronomer and physician. Armando Bukele Kattán – El Salvadoran industrialist and religious leader, converted to Islam from Christianity. Hamza Ali Abbasi – Former Pakistani actor, converted to Islam from atheism. Azkajwar-Abdallah – The Afrighid king of Khwarazm from the late 8th till the early 9th century. Abd Al Malik (born Régis Fayette-Mikano) – French rapper and poet. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (born Ferdinand Lewis Alcindor Jr.) – American professional basketball player and the NBA's former all-time leading scorer. Al-Ru'asi – Scholar of the Arabic language. He is considered to be the founder of the Kufan school of Arabic grammar. Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf – (born Chris Wayne Jackson) – American former professional basketball player. Shakib Arslan – Lebanese writer, poet, historian, politician, and Emir in Lebanon. Ahmed Abdullah (born Leroy Bland) – American jazz trumpeter.Abdullah, Ahmed Abdullah & Louis Reyes Rivera. "Excerpts from A Strange Celestial Road (Traveling the Spaceways)" , ahmedian.com. Retrieved 28 March 2015. Ka'b al-Ahbar – 7th-century Muslim scholar. Al-Hasan ibn Makhlad al-Jarrah – Senior official of the Abbasid Caliphate. Thomas J. Abercrombie – Photographer and writer for National Geographic. Edoardo Agnelli – American scion of business family. Roger Assaf – Lebanese playwright, director and actor. Robert of St. Albans – English Templar Knight who converted to Islam from Christianity in 1185. Addas – The Christian slave was supposedly the first person from the western province of Taif to convert to Islam. Ziya-ur-Rahman Azmi – Indian-born Saudi Arabian Islamic scholar who served as the Dean of the Department of Hadith at the Islamic University of Madinah. Hasan Akbar (born Mark Fidel Kools) – American citizen, and Sergeant, diagnosed with psychiatric problems, later sentenced to death for an attack of resentment.Goldman, Russell. "Fort Hood Shooter Could Join 5 Others on Death Row." ABC News. 13 November 2009. 1. Retrieved 21 October 2010. Shaheed Akbar (a.k.a. The Jacka, born Dominick Newton) – American rapper.MWA: Muslims With Attitude , illumemag.com. Retrieved 10 December 2017. Akhenaton – French rapper and producer; born Philippe Fragione. Aisha al-Adawiya – American interfaith activist and founder of Women in Islam. Baba Ali – Iranian-born American film developer, games developer, and businessman. Muhammad Ali (formerly known by his birth name Cassius Clay) – Professional boxer, activist, and philanthropist. Sadeq Ali (born Sri Gaur Kishore Sen) – Bengali author. Nicolas Anelka – French football manager and former player. Lewis Arquette – American actor; father of actors David, Rosanna, Patricia, Alexis, and Richmond Arquette; son of Cliff Arquette."Arquette Reconnects", Jewish Journal, 12 October 2002. Almış – Ruler of Volga Bulgaria. Eric Abidal – French former professional footballer. Muhammad Asad (born Leopold Weiss) – Austro-Hungarian born Deputy Secretary in the Foreign Ministry of Pakistan, known for an English translation of the Quran. Ziaur Rahman Azmi (born Banke Lal) – Author, scholar, professor and former Dean of the Department of Hadith at Islamic University of Madinah. Ivan Aguéli – Swedish wandering Sufi, painter and author. Suha Arafat – The widow of former Palestinian National Authority president Yasser Arafat. Malik Ambar – Siddi military leader, who served as the Peshwa (Prime Minister) of the Ahmadnagar Sultanate. Campbell Mustafa Ağa – Scottish convert to Islam who from 1775 was the chief instructor in the new Ottoman naval mathematical academy (the Hendishâne). Claude Alexandre, Count of Bonneval – French army officer who later went into the service of the Ottoman Empire, eventually converting to Islam and becoming known as Humbaracı Ahmet Paşa. Soliman Pasha al-Faransawi – Born Joseph Anthelme Sève, was a French-born Egyptian commander. Edoardo Agnelli – Eldest child and only son of Gianni Agnelli, the industrialist patriarch of Fiat S.p.A., he converted to Shia Islam when he was living in New York City. Güllü Agop – Ottoman Armenian theatre director as well as an occasional actor. Felix Aboagye – Retired Ghanaian professional footballer. Na'ila bint al-Furafisa – The wife of the third caliph Uthman (r. 644–656). Hamid Algar – British-American Professor Emeritus of Persian studies at the Faculty of Near Eastern Studies, University of California, Berkeley. Mercy Aigbe – Nigerian actress. Amina Titi Atiku-Abubakar – Second lady of Nigeria and women and child rights advocate. Mehmed Ali Pasha (marshal) – Prussian-born Ottoman career officer and marshal. Tatamkhulu Afrika – South African Poet, writer and anti-apartheid activist Brother Ali – American rapper, community activist, and member of the Rhymesayers Entertainment hip-hop collective. Anna Molka Ahmed — Pakistani artist and a pioneer of fine arts in the country after its independence in 1947. Bankole Awoonor-Renner — Ghanaian politician, journalist, anti-colonialist and Pan-Africanist.
B Baraq – ruler of the Chagatai Khanate who took the name Ghiyas-ud-din after converting.The preaching of Islam: a history of the propagation of the Muslim faith By Sir Thomas Walker Arnold, pg. 197 Khalid ibn Barmak – The first prominent member of the Barmakids, an important Buddhist family from Balkh, which converted to Islam and became prominent members of the Abbasid court in the second half of the 8th century. Caitlyn Bobb – Bermudan sprinter who primarily competes over 400 metres, in which she is the national record holder. James Phillip Barnes – American murderer and self-identified serial killer who was executed by the state of Florida for the 1988 rape and murder of Patricia Miller. Ali Bitchin – "renegade" who made his fortune in Algiers through privateering. Eugénie Le Brun – French-born early Egyptian feminist intellectual, influential salon host, and close friend of Huda Sha'arawi. Józef Bem – Polish engineer and general, an Ottoman pasha, a national hero of Poland and Hungary, and a figure intertwined with other European patriotic movements. Yahya al-Bahrumi – Greek American jihadist and spokesperson for the Islamic State B.G. Knocc Out (stage name for Al Hasan Naqiyy, born Arlandis Hinton) – American rapper Kristiane Backer – German television presenter. A. George Baker – American Protestant clergyman who converted to Islam. Yasin Abu Bakr (born Lennox Philip) – leader of the Jamaat al Muslimeen, a Muslim group in Trinidad and Tobago. Mutah Beale – better known as Napoleon, former member of Tupac Shakur's rap group, the Outlawz. Lutfunnisa Begum (born Rajkunwari) – consort of the Nawab of Bengal. Maurice Béjart – French choreographer.Chronicle, The New York Times, 3 April 1990. Robert "Kool" Bell – American musician. Danny Blum – German professional footballer. Mohammed Knut Bernström – Swedish ambassador.Archive for the Psychology of Religion By Jacob A. Belzen, Nils G. Holm, p. 51. Wojciech Bobowski – Polish musician; Bible translator.Wojciech Bobowski profile, siratalmustaqim.blog.onet.pl. Retrieved 25 March 2015. Lauren Booth – British broadcaster, journalist and human rights activist. Burna Boy – Nigerian singer, songwriter, and record producer. Surianshah of Banjar – Founder of Kingdom of Banjar and first sultan of the Sultanate of Banjar who ruled from his coronation in 1520 until his death in 1540. Charles Brooks, Jr. – first person in the United States to be executed using lethal injection, converted to Islam in prison, shortly before death.Final Meal Requests. Texas Department of Criminal Justice (12 September 2003); archived from the original on 2 December 2003. Retrieved 17 August 2007. H. Rap Brown – American civil rights activist. Bahmanyar – Iranian scholar and a pupil of Avicenna Davy van den Berg – Dutch professional footballer. Johann Ludwig Burckhardt – Swiss traveller, geographer, and Orientalist. Jonathan A. C. Brown – American Islamic scholar, professor and department chair at Georgetown University. Maurice Bucaille – French family physician of King Faisal. It is disputed whether he ever converted, and if he did, whether he publicly declared his conversion. He is reported in a 2013 Arab News newspaper article, "In his excitement, he stood before the attendants and loudly said, 'I have converted to Islam and believed in this Qur'an; however, no references are given. In other articles and videos he was normally very careful not to claim allegiance to any one faith. Abdullah ibn Buhaina (born Arthur Blakey) – American musician, also known as Arthur "Art" Blakey, American jazz drummer and bandleader; stopped being a practicing Muslim in the 1950s and continued to perform under the name "Art Blakey" throughout his career. Titus Burckhardt – Swiss writer and scholar. Berke – grandson of Genghis Khan, a Mongol military commander and ruler of the Golden Horde, who was responsible for the first official establishment of Islam in a khanate of the Mongol Empire. Jean-Alain Boumsong – French former professional footballer. Khalid Yahya Blankinship – American historian who specializes in Islamic and middle eastern studies. Harun el-Raschid Bey – During the First World War, he converted to Islam while serving with the general staff of the Ottoman Empire. Aisha Abdurrahman Bewley – convert to Islam and author or translator of many books on Islam. Carla Amina Baghajati – She has been described as one of the best-known faces of Islam in Austria. Jaylen Brown – American professional basketball player. Sultan Rafi Sharif Bey – Born Yale Jean Singer to an Orthodox Jewish family, he converted to Islam and took on the name Rafi Sharif in the late 1950s. Badhan (Persian governor) – Persian abna' leader and the Sasanian governor of Yemen during the reign of Khosrow II.