Curiosities and data to help you decide
Choosing a name isn't only about looking up meanings: it's noticing what's trending this year, understanding where a custom like compound names comes from, or just having a laugh at the more curious cases. This page brings that together — nothing that doesn't actually help someone naming their baby.
Guides to help you decide
Below you'll find data and oddities. These guides are something else: they answer the specific questions that come up once you actually have to decide.
- How to choose your baby's name without losing your mindAn order for deciding, and the mistakes almost everyone makes too late
- The name next to the surnames: how to tell if it worksRhythm, syllables and the sound clashes you only hear by saying it in full
- The nickname is the name that actually gets usedShort forms aren't chosen, they form on their own — it helps to know which one comes with each name
- Initials: the ten-second check nobody runs in timeAcronyms that spell words, siblings sharing a letter, and the monogram
- Popular name or uncommon name?What each option buys you and what it costs, with neither one romanticised
- Unisex names: what they actually are and what choosing one involvesA name can be masculine in one country and feminine in the next one over
- Naming a child who will grow up between two languagesHow a name travels between Spanish and English, and what each option costs
- Accents, the ñ and unusual spellingsWhat happens to a name once it's written down, and why the birth registration is the one thing you can't be careless about
Trending names, year by year
Names rise and fall in waves that last a decade or two. Spain's civil registry shows this clearly going back to the 1930s:
How the trend shifted in Spain, decade by decade
| 1930s-1960s | María, Carmen, Josefa | Manuel, Antonio, José |
| 1970s | María Carmen still first | David jumps from 46th to 1st |
| 1980s | María Carmen, Laura | David still leads |
| 1990s-2000s | Laura, María, Cristina | Alejandro takes over |
| 2000s onward | Lucía overtakes María | Alejandro, then Hugo |
| 2010s-2020s | Lucía holds the top spot | Hugo is the most common |
The most common right now
With 2025 data (or the latest published) from civil registries in four countries:
- Spain · 2023Lucía · Martín
- Mexico · 2025Camila · Santiago
- Argentina · 2025Isabella · Benjamín
- Colombia · 2025Sofía · David
Sources: INE (Spain, 2023), INEGI (Mexico, 2025), Renaper (Argentina, 2025) and Registraduría Nacional (Colombia, 2025).
Compound names: two names, one person
Across much of Latin America and Spain, a first name can carry two words: María José, Ana Belén, José Luis, Juan Carlos. It isn't a first name plus a separate middle name — the two are used and spoken together, and often shortened into their own nickname: Marisol, Maricarmen, Juanjo.
The custom is largely Catholic: pairing the name of a saint or a Marian title (María, José) with a second name that varies — placing the child under the protection of two figures instead of one. In Colombia's and Mexico's civil registries, "María" followed by a second name is still one of the most-registered combinations each year, even when "María" alone no longer tops the rankings.
The meaning of a compound name is, quite literally, the sum of both: María Victoria combines "of debated meaning" with "she who conquers". Ana Belén combines "grace" with the name of the city where Jesus was born.
A few frequent combinations
- María José — the Virgin's name paired with her husband's
- Ana Belén — widely used in Spain since the 1970s
- María Fernanda — one of the most-registered combinations in Colombia and Mexico
- José Luis — the classic male pairing
- Juan Carlos — popular across Latin America
- María Victoria — a classic combination in Spain and the Southern Cone
The names that repeat most in company leadership
Two recent studies, based on LinkedIn profiles holding leadership roles (CEO, director, founder, vice president), found very similar patterns in Spain and Mexico:
Mexico
- 1. Carlos
- 2. Alejandro
- 3. Juan
- 4. Luis
- 5. Jorge
cvapp.mx, across 3,303 leadership profiles
Spain
- 1. José
- 2. Juan
- 3. Javier
cvapp.es, across 3,902 leadership profiles
Among women in leadership roles, the most frequent names were Ana, Mariana, Claudia and María in Mexico, and María, Ana and Laura in Spain — though in both studies leadership roles are still mostly held by men (over 70% in each country), so the comparison isn't an even one. It's not a guarantee of professional success: it's a snapshot of which generation, and which names, were most common four or five decades ago, when today's executives were born.
Curious facts
A few records and oddities about given names:
The person with the most names in the world
New Zealander Laurence Watkins holds the Guinness World Record for 2,253 legally registered first names — among them "AZ2000", one of his names representing having names from A to Z plus roughly 2,000 more. No ID document can show his full name, and New Zealand changed its laws so no one could repeat the feat.
The longest name actually used day to day
Hubert Blaine Wolfeschlegelsteinhausenbergerdorff Sr., an American from Philadelphia, carried a 27-syllable name — one middle name for every letter of the German alphabet. Unlike the record above, this one was actually used in daily life: he signed as "Hubert Wolfe + 585, Sr."
The name invented in the 18th century
Vanessa doesn't come from any ancient language: writer Jonathan Swift coined it in 1726, blending syllables from the name of a friend of his, Esther Vanhomrigh (Van-Esther → Vanessa).
Names that are nearly the same name
Ana, Eva, Ivana, Juana, Yanina and Vania are all variants of the same root across different languages — "grace" or "God is gracious" — even though they don't look alike at first glance.
Names banned around the world
Not everything parents come up with can be registered. Some real examples of names a civil registry rejected:
- Robocop — rejected in Mexico for "lacking meaning"
- Nutella — rejected in France for being a brand name
- Ikea — rejected in Sweden for the same reason
- Osama Bin Laden — rejected in Germany over its historical association
- Lucifer — rejected in Germany for "satanic devotion"
- Talula Does the Hula From Hawaii — rejected in New Zealand: a judge said it would "embarrass" the child
- Cyanide — rejected in Wales for its association with poison
Fandom names: cartoons, athletes, artists
Every World Cup, every artist's tour, leaves a mark on civil registries. Cases documented in the press:
Neymar Yépez
an Ecuadorian boy named after the Brazilian footballer; his father brought home a jersey with the player's name before he was born
James
after James Rodríguez, widely used in Colombia and Ecuador after the 2014 World Cup
Piero Alessandro
after Alessandro Del Piero, world champion with Italy in 2006
In Ecuador's Guayas civil registry alone, 535 people are named Kylian, 267 are named Lionel and 207 are named Kendry, all registered within a single year — every one of them named after footballers who were trending when they were born.
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