International Baby Names
American Baby Names
Across 11 pages
of 11
Denali
Place-name and Native American
"the great one"
Alaska's Denali National Park is the home of the highest mountain in the US, officially renamed Denali in 2014, endowing the name with a lofty feel. Twice as many girls as boys were given the name in…
Danger
English word name
"exposure to injury, pain, harm, or loss"
Prime example of the aggressive word names that are an off-the-grid branch of the new macho names. Makes Cannon, Maverick, and Ranger feel almost soft and sensitive by comparison.
Boo
Word name or nickname
Boo as a first name first achieved notoriety as the name of the child-man in Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird. Arthur "Boo" Radley was meant to be frightening, but only in a simple, non-threatening…
Zuma
American place-name and Arabic
"peace"
Zuma was entered in the American name lexicon when musicians Gwen Stefani and Gavin Rossdale chose it for their son. Californians will recognize Zuma as the name of a beautiful beach in Malibu, and…
Jet
Mineral and word name
This super-charged variation of Jett is on the rise -- along with the unlikely newcomer Jetson.
Clinton
English
"hilltop town"
Like many names that have strong political connotations, the attractiveness of the name Clinton will be affected by your world-view. But, taking politics out of the equation, Clinton has a lovely…
Jersey
English place name, Old Norse
"Geirr's island"
An established place name, associated with a sunny island in the English Channel, the Garden State in the US, knitted pullovers, reality TV, and a Broadway musical. It peaked in the late 2000s and…
Beyonce
American invented name from Louisiana Creole
You know who Beyonce is. One of the most famous people in the world. When she was born, her name was truly unique; it was a riff on her mom's maiden name, Biyence, with an accent over the final E.…
Alaska
Native American
"great land"
State name Alaska stems from an Aleutian word for the land mass itself. The number of baby girls named Alaska has doubled in the past five years, and is sure to continue increasing as more place…
Indio
Spanish
"Indian"
This name of a California desert town, used by Deborah Falconer and Robert Downey, Jr. for their son, makes a much livelier and more individual – not to mention more masculine – improvisation on the…
Chenoa
Native American place name
Chenoa is the Native American name for the Kentucky River. This name has come into prominence as the stage name of Argentine singer María Laura Corradini Falomir. In the US it is given to a handful…
Roosevelt
Dutch
"rose field"
Presidential surname adopted as a first by numbers of midcentury African-American parents.
Renesmee
Literary invention
Invented by author Stephenie Meyer for the Twilight series for the half-human, half-vampire daughter of Edward Cullen and Bella Swan, it's an amalgamtion of the names of Bella's mother Renee and…
Indiana
American place-name
"land of the Indians"
Indiana is one of those place-names (think Camden and Trenton) that sounds cooler than the place that inspired it. Its fashionable -ana ending certainly sounds eminently name-like, and…
Rebel
Word name
"rebel"
Asking for trouble. Rebel Wilson is female, but this name is truly gender neutral, though hardly neutral in any other way. Rebel is undoubtedly one of the edgiest boys' names starting with the letter…
Huckleberry
Word name and literary name
Everybody knows Huckleberry Finn, the Mark Twain character named, Twain said, for the 19th century slang term for "humble." A few modern parents have put it on a birth certificate, including "Man Vs.…
Azure
English color name, Persian
"sky blue; lapis lazuli"
Azure is a colorful gender-neutral choice, currently used equally for baby girls and boys in the US. It refers to a specific shade of blue seen in a cloudless sky. Elon Musk revealed Azure to be the…
Pilot
Occupational name
One celebrity baby Pilot put this occupational choice into the pool -- together with the middle name Inspektor, something we wouldn't advise following.
Philadelphia
Greek place-name
"brotherly love"
Place-name mentioned in the New Testament and not yet on the name map. Philadelphia Thursday was the character played by Shirley Temple in John Ford's 1948 "Fort Apache."
Hiawatha
Iroquois
"he makes rivers"
Journalist Hiawatha Bray is a singular contemporary bearer of this name of a Native-American leader immortalized in a Longfellow poem.