Willow
Feminine · Old English roots · “the willow tree”
Willow is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 65,095 girls against 465 boys since 1880.
Willow is the English tree, taken whole into a name: two easy syllables, the second one opening out and away. It was a word in the language for centuries before it was anybody's name, which is why nobody has to ask how it is spelled or said.
How old is the name Willow?
Willow first appears in US birth records in 1890 — 135 years ago. The typical Willow is a kid of about 5 — this name's wave is very recent. About 64,000 people named Willow are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Willow most popular?
Willow peaked in 2022, reaching #37 nationally. Today it ranks #44, 7 places below that high. See the whole 2022 chart.
Where it comes from
From welig (Old English) to Willow
The story of Willow
The word traveled quietly through English on its own — welig in Old English, wilwe in Middle English, willow by the time it settled — naming the tree whose whippy shoots went into baskets, hurdles and, later, cricket bats. It came into use as a personal name in the same wave that gave English speakers Ivy, Hazel and Olive, when plant words were being lifted into the christening register. The tree had a literary life of its own well before that: Desdemona sings the willow song in Shakespeare's Othello, and it is a willow leaning over the brook where Ophelia drowns. In the last generation an American singer and actress has carried the name into wide public view.
Meaning
the willow tree
Straight from Old English welig, the name of the tree, cognate with Middle Dutch wilghe. The word came first; the name borrowed it.
Cultural footprint
Willow Smith (b. 2000) — "Whip My Hair" singer, daughter of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- weligOld English
- wilweMiddle English
- willow
- Willow
Pronouncing Willow
WIL-oh
Said exactly like the tree, stress on the first syllable. There is no competing pronunciation in English.
Nicknames for Willow
Moderate
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
- 1890
- Most girls named
- 20234,765 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #37reached in 2022
- Change vs 2023
- −0.0%4,763 in 2025, from 4,765
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.
Willow in other languages
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Ohio. International figures from Office for National Statistics, National Records of Scotland, Statistics Canada. Sources
Willows among us
people named Willow are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 337 born in 2025 was named Willow
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 Jacqueline test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Willow's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Jacqueline climbed just as high around 1961, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Jacqueline's path sketches the road Willow is walking now.
Willow sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Willow is headed
Willow should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High 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.
Willow beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Willow in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- The spelling is the ordinary English word, so it rarely needs repeating and almost never gets written down wrong.
- Pronunciation is fixed by the word itself — anyone reading it aloud for the first time gets it right.
- In active use across the English-speaking world, charting in England and Wales, Scotland and Canada as well as the United States.
- Shortens easily to Will or Willo, and stands perfectly well unshortened, which gives a child both registers to choose from.
- Almost everyone carrying this name right now is a child. It has little adult track record yet, so it can be hard to picture on a business card.
- It belongs to a crowded field of one-word nature names, and may be grouped with them in conversation even where no other Willow is nearby.
- The weeping willow has an old association with grief in English literature — Desdemona's song, the tree over Ophelia's brook. Most people never make the link; a few will.
- Shortened to Will, it points most listeners toward William, which is worth knowing in advance rather than discovering later.
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What they receive
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Willow
Feminine · Old English roots · #44 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Willows are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 64,000 people named Willow are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Willow in 2025?
- Willow ranks #44 among US girl names in 2025, with 4,763 babies given the name.
- How common is the name Willow?
- About 1 in every 337 US girls born in 2025 was named Willow — 4,763 in all.
- Will my child share the name Willow with classmates?
- Willow will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Willow
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Emilia#45 · Mila#43 · Elena#42 · Nova#46 · Abigail#41 · Naomi#47 · Riley#48 · Madison#40
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Willow? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Willow and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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