04 January 2024 , 14:32
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Parents are looking for unique baby names including Chosen and Love for their little ones in 2024, according to experts.
When it comes to naming a baby, there's a seemingly endless list of places to get inspiration from. Usually, baby name experts are pretty good at sniffing out the upcoming trends that influence mums and dads and have already predicted that elemental names and monikers inspired by the Barbie movie will be popular choices for the year ahead. But parents don't always follow the latest trends, and some names are rising in popularity that even the name experts "didn't see coming".
Sophie Kihm, editor-in-chief at Nameberry, explained there are some monikers on the rise that she believes will be popular among parents in 2024, even though she and fellow name experts had no idea mums and dads were interested - including unique names such as Chosen and Love.
Chosen
Chosen was introduced to the name pool back in 2015 when NFL quarterback Cam Newton used the unusual name for his son. And while the moniker didn't immediately take off, it's now a fast-rising name among new parents, especially as "modern spiritual names" become more favourable. Sophie told the Metro: "Chosen is a new favourite among modern spiritual names – a trend that has been picking up steam in the 2020s."
Neriah
Neriah stems from a minor male character in the Old Testament of the Bible, but according to Sophie, it's been rising in popularity for baby girls lately. While the name expert was "puzzled" to see the name gaining traction among new parents, the moniker isn't a complete surprise as there is an indie singer by the same name who could be inspiring mums and dads.
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Love
According to Sophie, Love was believed to be a "shoe-in" for one of the top middle names of the year, but it has surprised experts by rapidly rising as a first name too. She said: "Parents, well, love Love's amorous imagery and the ever-stylish V sound". The name is also used by a character in the Netflix series You, which may have inspired some parents.
Kayce
Kayce has risen in popularity thanks to the hit TV series Yellowstone, but while experts did predict that the series would cause the name Dutton to spike, they completely overlooked Kayce. Sophie explained she believed the name was "confusing to spell and pronounce" as it's said like Casey rather than Case, so she didn't think parents would go for it. "But parents proved us wrong – they've embraced Kayce almost as much as Dutton," she said.
Anime names
When it comes to blanket trends that are rising in popularity rather than single names, Sophie said the boom in "anime names" has surprised the Nameberry team the most. As names from anime and manga tend to have character-specific meanings they're not usually the first source of inspiration for baby names, but Sophie believes the rise in parents being influenced by their "own niche interests" has caused an increased interest in anime-inspired names.
Sophie also gave some examples of names that are on the rise in this topic, including Kaisen - taken from the title of the popular anime and manga series Jujutsu Kaisen - Kenji, a name that appears in several shows including Bungo Stray Dogs and in a manga series simply titled Kenji, and Jiraiya, the name of a character in the hugely popular Naruto series.