Notable people with this name include: •
Detlef Bothe (canoeist) (born 1957), East German sprint canoeist •
Detlef Bothe (actor) (born 1965), German actor •
Detlef Bruckhoff (born 1958), retired German footballer •
Detlef Enge (1952–2025), East German football player •
Detlef Franke (1952–2007), German Egyptologist •
Detlef Gerstenberg (1957–1993), East German hammer thrower •
Detlef Gromoll (1938–2008), German mathematician •
Detlef Grumbach (born 1955), German author and journalist •
Detlef Hofmann (born 1963), German sprint canoeist •
Detlef Kästner (born 1958), East German boxer •
Detlef Kübeck (born 1956), retired East German sprinter •
Detlef Kirchhoff (born 1967), German rower •
Detlef Kraus (1919–2008), German pianist •
Detlef Laugwitz (1932–2000), German mathematician •
Detlef Lewe (1939–2008), West German sprint canoeist •
Detlef Lienau (1818–1887), German architect born in Denmark •
Detlef Lohse (born 1963), German fluid mechanics researcher •
Detlef Michel (born 1955), German track and field athlete •
Detlef Nebbe (1912–1972), SS-Hauptscharführer and member of staff at Auschwitz concentration camp •
Detleff Neumann-Neurode (1879–1945), pioneering German pediatric physical therapist •
Detlef Okrent (1909–1983), German field hockey player •
Detlef Pirsig (1945–2019), former German football player •
Detlef Quadfasel, professor of geophysics at Niels Bohr Institute •
Detlef Raugust (born 1954), German former footballer •
Detlef Richter (born 1956), East German bobsledder •
Detlef Sack (born 1965), professor of Comparative Political Science at Bielefeld University •
Detlef Schößler (born 1962), German former footballer, now a coach •
Detlef Schmidt (born 1958), West German sprint canoeist •
Detlef Schrempf (born 1963), retired German NBA basketball player •
Detlef Siebert, German television writer, director and producer, working in the UK •
Detlef Soost (born 1970), German dancer and choreographer •
Detlef Thorith (1942–2019), retired East German discus thrower •
Detlef Uhlemann (born 1949), former West German distance runner •
Detlef Ultsch (born 1955), former East German judoka •
Detlef Wagenknecht (born 1959), East German middle-distance runner •
Detlef Weigel (born 1961), German American scientist working at the interface of developmental and evolutionary biology •
Detlef Wiedeke (born 1950), German singer, composer and producer •
Gustavus Detlef Hinrichs (1836–1923), published findings on chemical element periodicity before Dmitri Mendeleev or Lothar Meyer