{"id":47781,"date":"2026-06-10T04:24:28","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T04:24:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/47781\/"},"modified":"2026-06-10T04:24:28","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T04:24:28","slug":"babycenters-report-is-in-k-pop-90s-nostalgia-and-soft-era-names-are-dominating-the-baby-name-charts-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/47781\/","title":{"rendered":"BabyCenter’s report is in. K-pop, ’90s nostalgia, and ‘soft era’ names are dominating the baby name charts"},"content":{"rendered":"

For over 20 years, parents<\/a> have registered their little ones\u2019 names<\/a> in BabyCenter<\/a>, which then compiles common patterns into a monthly, mid-year, and annual report<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2025, classic, vintage names with \u201cspiritual roots\u201d and \u201ccottagecore\u201d<\/a> vibes like Olivia, Amelia, Noah, and Liam were all the rage.\u00a0<\/p>\n

But according to BabyCenter\u2019s 2026 mid-year report, things have taken a different turn. Rather than the literary, folks are inspired by \u201990s nostalgia, K-pop mania, and, perhaps most surprisingly, the cosmos.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Huntrix-themed names are golden<\/p>\n

KPop Demon Hunters dominated the pop culture zeitgeist last year, so it makes sense that parents would be inspired not only by character names from the show, but by the actresses who played them.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The names Rumi, Zoey, Jinu, and Celine are all going up, up, up. Not to mention Arden, after Arden Cho, who voiced Rumi.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Year of the Fire Horse-themed name<\/p>\n

\"chineseChinese Zodiac Sign. Photo Credit: Canva<\/a><\/p>\n

In addition, names associated with fire and light\u2014like Phoenix, Apollo, Leo, Elio, Kasai<\/a> (a Japanese name said to mean \u201cflame\u201d), Ember, Elaine (a French form of Helen meaning \u201cray\u201d or \u201csunbeam\u201d), Marisol, Sol, and Blaze\u2014are having their day in the sun.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The general hypothesis behind this is that parents are inspired by 2026 being the year of the Fire horse in the Chinese zodiac.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Because Millennials are gonna Millennial, many \u201990s and early 2000s hits, which have found new life on streaming, are becoming name fodder.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Monica and Ross, al\u00e1 Friends, have jumped spots. The show also happened to release on YouTube last year. Coincidence? We think not.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Scrubs and Malcolm in the Middle, both of which got reboots, have influenced more parents to use names like Carla, Dorian (J.D.\u2019s last name), Reese, and Lois.\u00a0<\/p>\n

While not sitcoms, Grey\u2019s Anatomy and High School Musical made 20-year milestones in 2025. This, in turn, put the names Gabriella, Troy, Zeke, Martha, Callie, Derek, Miranda, and Arizona in better favor.\u00a0Thankfully, parents know better than to name their kids Sharpay.<\/p>\n

BabyCenter also noted an incoming \u201csoft era\u201d for both boys and girls<\/p>\n

By \u201csoft,\u201d the company is referring to \u201cnames that start or end with vowels and have soft consonants.\u201d We see this in the aforementioned names Leo, Elias, Rumi, and Carla. Some other examples: Ariel, Isa, Alonso, and Milo.\u00a0<\/p>\n

A preference for soft names could be why there\u2019s a simultaneous drop in girl names starting with \u201cAd-.\u201d Ada, Adelyn, Adalee, Adira, Adina, Adilene, Adhara, and Adele have all dropped.\u00a0<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not to say that long-reigning champs have totally lost their mojo. Olivia, Sophia, Charlotte, Noah, Liam, and Elijah, for instance, are still going strong. But a lot of things can change between now and when BabyCenter releases their full annual report. Either way, it\u2019s always interesting to see what patterns pop up, what cultural aspects are staying on people\u2019s minds, and, most importantly, which customized name bracelets are going to sell out the fastest in a few years\u2019 time.\u00a0<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re curious, here are the Top 10 girl and boy names so far<\/p>\n

The top 10 girl names:<\/p>\n

Olivia<\/p>\n

Amelia<\/p>\n

Eliana<\/p>\n

Sophia<\/p>\n

Charlotte<\/p>\n

Isabella<\/p>\n

Emma<\/p>\n

Aurora<\/p>\n

Ellie<\/p>\n

Evelyn<\/p>\n

The top 10 boy names:<\/p>\n

Noah<\/p>\n

Liam<\/p>\n

Oliver<\/p>\n

Elijah<\/p>\n

Mateo<\/p>\n

Levi<\/p>\n

Lucas<\/p>\n

Ezra<\/p>\n

Elias<\/p>\n

Leo<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For over 20 years, parents have registered their little ones\u2019 names in BabyCenter, which then compiles common patterns…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":47782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[27970,195,12925,27971],"class_list":["post-47781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-korea","tag-home-life","tag-k-pop","tag-kids","tag-parenting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/47782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/korea\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}