The East Asian island nation of Japan, which welcomes hundreds of thousands of babies every year, doesn’t release official baby name rankings.
But the most popular names of 2025 may have included Sui, Sana, and Ema for girls and Ao, Minato, and Haruto for boys.
How do we know?
Because, every year, two Japanese companies — the Benesse Corporation (which owns pregnancy/childcare brand Tamahiyo) and the Meiji Yasuda Life Insurance Company — come up with unofficial rankings using their own data.
- Benesse/Tamahiyo’s rankings account for 166,011 babies born in Japan from January to September, 2025.
- Meiji Yasuda’s rankings account for 12,505 babies born in Japan from January to September, 2025.
Both companies rank names in two different ways: as they’re written, and as they’re said aloud (because many Japanese names have several possible pronunciations).
So below you’ll find eight sets of rankings. They account for two genders, two sources, and two ways of judging popularity: written vs. readings. (The rankings needed to be turned into images because my blogging software can’t handle Chinese and Japanese characters.)
Girl names
Here are Japan’s top girl names as written, according to both companies:
The girl name in the No. 1 spot on both lists is commonly read “Sui” or “Midori.”
(According to Benesse’s data, Sui ranked 95th in 2020, 40th in 2021, 16th in 2022, and 3rd in both 2023 and 2024.)
And here are Japan’s top girl-name readings, according to both companies:
The top girl-name reading on Benesse’s list is Sana, while the top girl-name reading on Meiji Yasuda’s list is Ema.
Boy names
Here are Japan’s top boy names as written, according to both companies:
The top boy name on Benesse’s list is commonly read “Ao,” while the top boy name on Meiji Yasuda’s list is commonly read “Minato” or “So.”
And here are Japan’s top boy-name readings, according to both companies:
The boy-name reading in the No. 1 spot on both lists is Haruto.
Sources:
- Japan’s 2025 baby name rankings – Benesse/Tamahiyo
- Japan’s 2025 baby name rankings – Meiji Yasuda
- Baseel, Casey. “Top Japanese baby names for 2025 feature flowers, colors.” Japan Today 3 Nov. 2025.
- “Sui and Minato: Japan’s Top 2025 Baby Names.” Nippon.com 16 Dec. 2025.
Top image: Adapted from Flag of Japan (public domain)
