Arden

Arden is a gender-neutral name that's sleek and stylish but always seems to bob just below the surface of popularity, despite ticking all the boxes with its fashionable two-syllable, N-ending shape and its awesome nature-inspired meanings. In recent US statistics, 51 percent of the babies named Arden were boys to 59 percent girls.

A locational surname name deriving from several places in England, there are multiple legitimate derivations for this name. One is from Old English earn "eagle" + denu "valley", while another is from the Celtic ard meaning "high".

For literature lovers: Arden is the name of the magical forest in Shakespeare's As You Like It (Shakespeare's mother's name was Mary Arden), and it also appears in the name and titular character of a poem by Tennyson, Enoch Arden.

In the UK, this name leans far more masculine; it ranked in the Top 800 in a recent year and of all the babies called Arden, it was chosen for boys 85% of the time.

Pronounced AHR-den.

As of October 2026, Arden ranked #1005 in US births in 2025 SSA, peaked at #466 in 1934, Nameberry popularity #323.