Latin is the largest sourced origin in this catalogue and the least likely to be advertised as one. Nobody chooses Stella because it is Latin; they choose it because it sounds right, and it happens to mean star.
Seventy-five names here have a source stating a Latin origin, and they average 341 registrations each against 68 across the catalogue. That is five times the rate. Latin names are not a niche: they are the names that stayed.
The shape of them
46 of the 75 are two syllables and 13 are one. 43 measure female against 30 male, and the sound splits between soft at 27 and easy-to-call at 23, with elegant on 11. That is the profile of a name that has been in use long enough to be worn smooth.
Stella at 3,327 registrations and Luna at 2,762 lead it, then Lucy, Leo, Rufus and Lucas. Twelve of the seventy-five carry a meaning checked against its cited page: Luna is the moon, Lucy is light, Leo is the lion.
Why so few names carry the label
Because the label is recorded, never inferred. A name gets an origin here only when a source states one in as many words, and thousands of names that are obviously Latin in root have no page saying so. Seventy-five is what is sourced, not what exists.
It also means the count is a floor. If a name you expect is missing from this list, the likeliest reason is that nobody wrote it down, not that it came from somewhere else.
What are the most popular Latin pet names?
Stella at 3,327 registrations, then Luna at 2,762, Lucy, Leo, Rufus and Lucas. The seventy-five Latin names here average 341 registrations each, five times the catalogue rate.
Why are Latin names so widely used?
They have had the longest run. Nothing in this data explains taste, but the measurement is clear: names with a recorded Latin origin are carried by five times as many animals as the catalogue average.
How is a name recorded as Latin?
Only when a cited source states it. Thousands of names with obvious Latin roots have no page saying so, and those are left blank rather than guessed at.
Are Latin names more female?
Slightly: 43 of the 75 measure female against 30 male. The rest have too thin a sexed sample to call.
Two Latin lists, not one
Read the seventy-five and they fall into two groups that have nothing to do with each other. One is Rome: Nero, Titus, Julius, Augustus, Marcus, Magnus, Juno, Diana, Victoria, Pax. The other is the garden: Olive, Sage, Maple, Juniper, Cedar, Flora, Pepper.
The second group is Latin because botany is Latin. Nobody naming a dog Juniper is reaching for Rome; they are reaching for a plant that happens to carry its Latin name into English intact. Both are correctly filed, and they answer completely different searches.
23 of the 75 end in -a, the highest share of any origin here, and 26 are four letters or fewer.
Where they sit on the popularity scale
11 land in the popular band, 25 in common, 36 in rare and 3 in very unique. That is an unusually even spread — most slices on this site pile up at one end. Latin gives you Stella at 3,327 registrations and Vesper at 18 from the same list.
37 of the 75 also carry a style tag, so half of this list is reachable from a themed page too. That overlap is why a name can be Latin and space-themed and flower-inspired at once without any of the three being wrong.
Are Latin pet names all Roman?
No, and that is the useful thing about the list. Half are Rome — Nero, Titus, Juno, Diana — and half are botany, because plant names carry their Latin into English: Olive, Sage, Maple, Juniper, Cedar.
Every count on this site is a tally of real registrations: pet licences and shelter intakes published as open data by New York, Seattle, Austin, Montgomery County, Cambridge, Zurich, Basel and three Australian councils. Popularity here is the average share a name holds across those registers, so a name common in a small city is not buried by one common in a large one. Nine of the eleven sources are North American, so read the ordering as naming in those places rather than worldwide. Browse the whole catalogue or read how the data is put together.