Soft Boy Names Are Sensitive And Strong

Updated Fri Apr 05 2024

Soft boy names are the antidote to the hyper-macho names that have been trending for the last couple of decades, like Gunner, Maverick, Ryker and Colt.

As girls marched further into masculine naming territory, claiming previously male names like Avery and Addison for their own, boys needed increasingly macho names (or so the thinking went) to set them apart.

As with clothes, toys, hobbies, even career aspirations, boy names on girls were considered strong and empowering, but parents shied away from anything too “girly” for their sons.

Happily, times are changing and society is becoming much more comfortable with the blurring of conventional gender roles and identities. Celebrities like Harry Styles, Timothée Chalamet and Jungkook prove that boys can be strong, smart, sweet, sensitive, stylish and sophisticated, all at the same time.

And boy names are shifting toward the softer side along with this new perception of masculinity.

Soft names for boys contain lots of liquid and sibilant sounds, such as R, L and S. They are vowel-rich, and often feature vowel endings including the conventionally feminine A sound, which is more popular for American boys now than ever before.

Here, some of the most stylish soft boy names right now.

Popular Soft Boy Names

The current Top 5 boy names in the US all feature soft, warm sounds and plenty of vowels: Liam, Noah, Oliver, James and Elijah.

Popular categories of soft boy names include gentle Biblical names like Asher, Gabriel, Josiah and Silas. Suave, cosmopolitan boy names from Romance languages like Spanish and Italian also qualify: think Emiliano, Gael, Luca and Thiago.

These soft choices are all among the current Top 200 most popular names for boys in the US.

Cool Soft Boy Names

A little further below the radar are many cool boy names on the rise that feature softer sounds. Choices like Amiri, Camilo and Koa were among the fastest rising boy names of 2022, the latest year on record. All jumped more than 150 places compared to the previous year.

The cool soft boy names below are uncommon but on trend. They rank below the #200 mark in the US (for now!) but within the Top 1000, and we expect to hear more of them in the coming years.

Unique Soft Boy Names

These highly unusual choices rank below the current Top 1000 baby boy names in the US. They’re standout choices due to their rarity, but their soft sounds and sensitive charm means that they retain a calm, unassuming appeal.

Find a selection of our favorite uncommon soft names for boys below.

Feminine Boy Names

Celebrity parents have kicked off this trend of traditionally feminine names for boys, from Rihanna and A$AP Rocky's son Riot Rose, to Chrissy Teigen and John Legend's son Wren.

We predict a rise in gender-bending and gender-busting baby names as Gen-Z starts to take over from Millennials as the primary group for new parents.

These are conventionally feminine sounding names or unisex names more common for girls in the US right now. But for the next generation of fashion-forward baby namers, this will no longer be seen as a defect but as a cool and quirky subversion of gender norms.

About the Author

Emma Waterhouse

Emma Waterhouse joined the team in 2017, writing about everything from the top baby name trends 2023 to how not to choose the next big baby name. As Nameberry's head moderator, she also helps to keep our active forums community ticking.

Emma's articles on names and naming trends have been featured in publications including the Huffington Post, People, Today's Parent, Fatherly, and Good Housekeeping.

A linguist by background, Emma speaks several languages and lives in England's smallest county with her husband and four young children. You can reach her at emma@nameberry.com.

View all of Emma Waterhouse's articles