Baby Name Together

Review by eFreeware

Choosing a name tends to stall when two people have different taste and no way to compare it. Baby Name Together is built for that exact standoff: a free parenting app from the developer Linkinet in which each parent swipes through names on their own, and the app surfaces only the ones both of them liked. If you and your partner have been trading the same four suggestions for weeks, that premise is the reason to look at it.

The scale is not trivial. The app has more than a million installs and holds a 4.2 average from 6,858 ratings, and it has been on Google Play since August 2014, with an update in October 2026. That history matters less than what it contains: a catalog of 30,000 or more names, a name assistant, a community side, and a Pro tier that adds collaboration and backup. I'll go through what each part does, what the app asks of you, and who it fits.

Swiping separately, matching together

The core loop is simple by design. Liking a name means swiping one way, rejecting it the other. Your partner does the same on their own phone, and the app keeps those judgments private until it finds a name you both approved. Nothing gets vetoed out loud, because neither of you sees what the other passed on. The result is a shortlist of mutual likes rather than a negotiation.

Both parents need the app, joined by email. The developer frames this as the way to keep the process argument-free. Colors speed up browsing: pink marks girls' names, blue marks boys', and purple covers unisex and gender-neutral ones.

I'd expect the appeal to be strongest for couples who are early in the process and want volume before they narrow anything down. Thirty thousand names is far more than most people will consider seriously, and the swipe format is a way to move through that pile without treating every option as a debate.

Sorting 30,000 names down to a shortlist

A catalog that size needs filters, and the app provides an advanced filtering menu. You can sort by gender, including unisex, boy and girl names, by the first or last letter, by the length of a first name, and by compound names. That last option is useful if you already know you want something like a two-part first name and don't want to scroll past everything else to find it.

Each name carries more than a label. The app shows meanings, origin, popularity statistics by country, average age, and celebrities who share the name. It also plays pronunciation audio in different languages, which matters if you are considering a name from a language you don't speak and want to know how it actually sounds before you commit to it.

The catalog draws on names from more than 40 countries, including France, Japan, India, Sweden and the USA, and the app adds new names daily. There is also a trending section showing the top 20 names in many countries, which is a quick way to see what is currently common in a place you care about. If you want something that won't be shared by three other children in the same classroom, that list is the one to check before you fall in love with a name.

The assistant, the community and the extras

The newer addition is an AI name assistant you chat with for suggestions. The developer pitches it as a way to ask for sibling name ideas, to search by meaning or theme, and to get an explanation of why a particular match appealed to both parents, reached by tapping a sparkle icon on a match. Conversations can be saved and returned to later. Unlimited access to the assistant sits behind the Pro upgrade.

The Pro tier also covers a few practical things. You can share your list and collaborate with up to four people, which is the feature to consider if an older sibling wants a say or if you want input from grandparents. Lists sync across phones and tablets, and a cloud backup keeps them online so they can be retrieved for a later pregnancy. The AI list, trained on what the developer describes as real parents' choices, is also part of Pro, and it learns after each swipe.

Alongside the naming tools there is a parent community. It includes a forum for names, pregnancy and parenthood, names submitted by other parents that you can browse, and a polling feature that lets you put a name to a vote among friends, family or other users. You can also see what other parents are naming their children, which is a different kind of signal from a popularity chart. Announcement cards round out the package for gender reveal parties, baby showers and birth announcements, and a news feed covers celebrity baby names and trending choices.

I'd treat the community side as a bonus rather than the reason to install. The swiping and matching is the part that solves a specific problem; the forum and polls are there for people who want company while they decide.

What it asks of you, and what it costs

The app is free to download and carries ads, and it offers in-app purchases. Several features sit in the Pro tier: unlimited use of the AI assistant, the AI list, collaboration with up to four people, syncing across devices and cloud backup.

The bigger requirement is structural. Matching works only when both parents have the app and connect by email. One person swiping alone gets a list of names they like; the reveal of mutual matches needs the second account. That is not a flaw so much as the premise.

There is also a learning curve in the catalog itself. Filters exist precisely because 30,000 names is too many to browse raw, and you'll get more out of the app if you spend a few minutes setting the gender, letter and length options before you start swiping. The name assistant is the other place where a bit of experimentation pays off, since asking it for a theme or a meaning is more useful than asking it for names in general.

None of this is complicated, but it is the difference between treating the app as a slot machine of names and using it as a tool that narrows a very large field down to something you can actually discuss.

Couples who keep circling the same names

The clearest fit is two parents who have reached an impasse. If every conversation about names ends with each person restating a favorite and neither moving, the private swipe and mutual-match reveal removes the part of the conversation that stalls. The shortlist it produces is small enough to argue about properly, which is a better problem to have.

It also suits parents who want range. Names from more than 40 countries, meaning and origin details, pronunciation audio and country-by-country statistics make it a reasonable reference for someone who wants a name with a specific heritage or a specific sound. The filters are what keep that breadth manageable.

Couples who want the wider family involved will find the Pro collaboration useful, and anyone who plans to reuse the list for a second child has the cloud backup to lean on. The app is rated for Everyone and is free to install, so trying the core swiping costs nothing beyond the ads.

A shared shortlist beats a stalemate

Baby Name Together does one thing that most name apps don't: it makes agreement the output rather than the input. The swiping is quick, the matching is private, and the catalog behind it is deep enough that you won't exhaust it in an evening. The filters, meanings, pronunciation and country data turn it into a reference as well as a game, and the community and announcement features add value for people who want them.

The trade-offs are honest ones. Ads and in-app purchases are part of the free version, the AI tools and collaboration sit in Pro, and the matching feature needs both parents to install the app and link accounts.

For couples who are stuck, though, this is a sensible thing to install before the next round of the same conversation. Set up both accounts, spend a little time on the filters, and let the app do the part that has been going in circles.

What's new in version 5.0.0

• New (Pro): the AI list. An AI trained on real parents' choices picks names that match your taste, and your partner's, and learns after every swipe. • New introduction on first launch. • Bug fixes and improvements.