Amaro
Meaning
Galician, Portuguese and Spanish name of uncertain meaning, perhaps from Latin amarus, "bitter", or the Visigothic name Amalric
The story
In a Galician legend, Amaro returns to his boat and discovers that three hundred years have passed. Nobody recognizes him. He had sailed in search of earthly paradise and climbed to the highest point of an island; the journey’s extraordinary turn belongs to the legend, not a dated voyage. The Real Academia Galega describes Amaro as a literary name that spread in the late Middle Ages, perhaps from Portugal through the Vida de santo Amaro. Its meaning is less securely known: Latin amarus, “bitter,” and the name Amalric are proposals, not settled answers. Portuguese literature later gave a separate fictional priest, Amaro Vieira, the name in Eça de Queirós’s O Crime do Padre Amaro. That novel had a changing life on paper: a magazine version in 1875 was followed by two substantially rewritten book versions.
How popular is Amaro around the world?
In the United States, Amaro is on the Social Security birth record for 2020 to 2025. In Chile, 643 boys were registered as Amaro in 2021, every accent spelling counted together.
Amaro is on the official records of the United States, Chile, Montevideo, Brazil, Argentina, France and Spain.
United States
on record
In the United States, Amaro is on the Social Security birth record for 2020 to 2025.
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Amaro has stayed rare in US records the whole time: no peak decade to name.
Births with a Social Security record. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration
Chile
1 in 280
In Chile, 643 boys were registered as Amaro in 2021, every accent spelling counted together.
share of that year’s name registrations
First-name registrations with Chile’s civil registry by year of registration, 1920–2021, counted as spelling groups (Sofía, Sofia and Sofìa are one name, shown with its most-registered spelling); the registry withholds nothing, nametree keeps the groups that reached 5 registrations in some year, and shares divide by every registration of the year. Source: Servicio de Registro Civil e Identificación (Chile) via the guaguas package, first-name registrations 1920-2021
Montevideo City
1 in 6,200 · 2011
In Montevideo, 4 boys named Amaro were born in 2011, spelling variants counted together.
The count never rose above 5 in a year, too few to chart.
Births in the department of Montevideo (not all of Uruguay) by first name and year of birth, 1940–2011, from the city’s civil registry, which writes names in capitals, almost always without accents; counted as spelling groups (accent and punctuation variants merged), nothing is withheld at source, and 2012 is excluded as a partial year. Source: Servicio de Registro Civil, Intendencia de Montevideo, Partidas de Registro Civil de Montevideo (Licencia de Datos Abiertos - Uruguay); 2012 dropped as partial
Brazil
1 in 8,600
At the 2022 census, 23,543 people in Brazil were named Amaro, the 956th most common name, with a median age of 61.
Among people named Amaro living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 1950s than in any other decade.
people alive at the 2022 census, by decade of birth
The census also counted 63 born between 2020 and August 2022, too recent a span to chart. People alive and resident in Brazil at the 2022 census, a living-population count, not births; names under 20 are withheld at source. Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
Argentina
1 in 14,000
In Argentina, 48 newborns were given the name Amaro in 2024.
share of that year’s name registrations
Given-name components of births in Argentina 2012–2024; national cells are lower bounds and no sex split is published. Source: RENAPER (Argentina), Dirección Nacional de Población, given names 2012-2024
France
1 in 43,000
In France, about 15 boys named Amaro were born in 2025, ranked 1,840th among boys that year.
share of that year’s births on record
Births in France by year of birth, from INSEE’s fichier des prénoms (1900–2025; Mayotte from 2012); exact spellings count separately (Léo and Leo are different names), any spelling under 3 in a year and sex is withheld at source, every count is rounded to the nearest 5 at source, and nametree keeps the spellings that reached 20 in some year. Shares divide by INSEE’s count of births in France from 1957, and before that by the file’s own total for the year; INSEE says the file is not complete before 1946. Source: Insee, fichier des prénoms (last updated 2026-07-16)
Spain
1 in 56,000
In Spain, 800 residents are named Amaro, ranked 1,630th among men, with a mean age of 39.6 years.
Residents of Spain on 1 January 2025. Spain publishes how old a name’s living bearers are, not a birth series, so there is no year chart. Source: INE (Spain), Censo de Población anual, 1 January 2025
England and Wales
last on record 2021
Amaro is not on the 2025 record for England and Wales, where spellings under 3 in a year are withheld at source.
The count never rose above 4 in a year, too few to chart.
Birth registrations in England and Wales (not the whole UK); exact spellings are counted separately, and any spelling under 3 in a year is withheld at source. Source: Office for National Statistics, baby names in England and Wales
Not on the record in Mexico City, Puerto Rico, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand and Scotland: those registries withhold small counts, so rare uses may sit below their floors.
Not on the South Australia record for 1944 to 2017: that registry withholds nothing, so this spelling was not given there in those years.
Keep exploring
The Amaro deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Amaro truly comes from, how it traveled, and what a century of records reveals. If you have grown a tree on nametree, it also considers how Amaro fits with your family’s names and surname.
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