Indigo
Feminine · Greek roots · “the Indian dye”
Indigo is given to both — 4,020 girls and 1,222 boys since 1880. See Indigo as a boy nameSee other names given to both
Indigo is the name of a color and of the dye that made it — a word English borrowed in the sixteenth century from Spanish and Portuguese traders, who had it from Latin and, before that, from a Greek word meaning simply "the Indian thing". It is three even syllables ending in a bright open vowel, and it comes with short forms already worn in: Indi, Indie, Indy.
How old is the name Indigo?
Indigo first appears in US birth records in 1971 — 54 years ago. The typical Indigo is a kid of about 7 — this name's wave is very recent. About 4,000 people named Indigo are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Indigo most popular?
Indigo peaked in 2025, reaching #853 nationally. Today it ranks #853, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Indigo appears on these lists:
Where it comes from
From indikon (Greek) to Indigo
The story of Indigo
The word traveled the same route as the dye itself. Greek writers called the deep blue pigment arriving from the East indikon — the Indian thing — and Latin turned that into indicum; Spanish and Portuguese merchants carried índigo into western Europe, and English took it up in the sixteenth century. When Isaac Newton divided the spectrum into seven colors in the seventeenth century, indigo was one of the names he used, which is why generations of schoolchildren have recited it between blue and violet. Its life as a given name is much newer: like Violet, Scarlett and Hazel, it crossed from color word to first name, and in the United States it has been rising steadily rather than arriving all at once.
Meaning
the Indian dye; the deep blue-violet color it makes
From Greek indikon, "Indian (dye)", by way of Latin indicum and Spanish/Portuguese índigo.
How the name formed
- indikonGreek
- indicumLatin
- índigoSpanish/Portuguese
- indigoEnglish
Related forms: Índigo · Índigo · Indigo · Indigo · Indaco
Pronouncing Indigo
IN-di-goh
Three syllables, stress on the first, exactly as the color is said. English speakers read it correctly on sight, and the spelling survives most other languages unchanged.
Nicknames for Indigo
High
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1971
- Most girls named
- 2025318 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #853reached in 2025
- Change vs 2024
- +10.0%318 in 2025, from 289
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Indigo in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Índigo in Spanish — spelling variant
- Índigo in Portuguese — spelling variant
- Indigo in French — same name
- Indigo in German — same name
- Indaco in Italian — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, New York.
Indigos among us
people named Indigo are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 5,054 born in 2025 was named Indigo
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Michal test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Indigo's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Michal climbed just as high around 1942, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Michal's path sketches the road Indigo is walking now.
Indigo is climbing fast right now. Steep climbs tend to come with steep descents — the quicker a name arrives, the more firmly it belongs to its moment.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Indigo is headed
Indigo should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
Medium confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Indigo beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Indigo in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Everyone already knows how to spell it and say it — it is a word in the everyday language, not a name to be repeated twice on the phone.
- Comes with ready-made short forms: Indi, Indie, Indy, all in real use.
- The word is close to identical in Spanish, Portuguese, French and German, so it travels without being reshaped.
- A documented history in English since the sixteenth century, and in Greek and Latin long before that.
- It is still uncommon enough that an Indigo will likely be the only one anywhere nearby, and the name is climbing — so it may feel noticeably more familiar by the time this child is grown than it does now.
- Color names invite comment. Expect the occasional "like the color?" and the occasional confusion with India or Indiana, particularly around the short form Indy.
- Indigo dye has a hard history: it was grown with enslaved labor in the colonial Caribbean and the American South, and forced cultivation in Bengal provoked revolt in the nineteenth century. Most people never think of it; some families will want to know.
- US records list Indigo mainly for girls, but it is a word rather than a name with two separate roots, and it is given to boys as well — a boy called Indigo will simply be in the smaller group.
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What they receive
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Indigo
Feminine · Greek roots · #853 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Indigos are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 4,000 people named Indigo are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Indigo in 2025?
- Indigo ranks #853 among US girl names in 2025, with 318 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Indigo?
- About 1 in every 5,054 US girls born in 2025 was named Indigo — 318 in all.
- Will my child share the name Indigo with classmates?
- Indigo will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Indigo
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Anaiah#853 · Paula#853 · Kelly#851 · Chelsea#851 · Nala#856 · Jamie#857 · Darcy#857 · Kendra#849
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Indigo? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Indigo and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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