Iris
Meaning
rainbow, iris flower
The story
Iris is three things at once and always was. In Greek she is the goddess of the rainbow and the messenger who carries word between the gods and the world, travelling the arc as a road. The flower took the name for its colors, and the colored ring of the eye took it too, which is why an eye doctor and a gardener are both quietly speaking Greek. What makes Iris unusual in our data is that it never really left. Most vintage names vanish for two generations before returning; Iris held between about 4,700 and 9,000 babies a decade from the 1920s straight through the 1990s, and then rose to more than 17,000 so far this decade. Our own records also file it among dual-language names and note its use in Chinese American families, one of the small set of English names that travels without adjustment.
Iris in song
Iris
Goo Goo Dolls (1998)
Written for the City of Angels soundtrack and one of the biggest rock songs of the decade, though the name never appears in the lyric, Johnny Rzeznik borrowed it from the singer Iris DeMent.
Popularity, 1890–2024
Shape drawn from US Social Security baby-name records. Iris peaked in the 2020s.
Popularity in Brazil
56,795 people · the #519 first name in Brazil · about 1 in 3,571 · median age 29
Among people named Iris living in Brazil at the 2022 census, more were born in the 2000s than in any other decade.
The census also counted 5,144 born between 2020 and August 2022, too recent a span to chart.
Source: IBGE, Censo Demográfico 2022
The Iris deep dive
Whether you’re naming a baby or exploring your own name’s history, this is a personal letter, not a list: where Iris 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 Iris fits with your family’s names and surname.
Where Iris travels
Chinese American · the Greek messenger goddess; resonant in the community through writer Iris Chang, with a natural floral, luminous feel
Greek · rainbow, messenger goddess
Dual-language · rainbow, the Greek messenger goddess; also matches the Cantonese element 芷 (tsz/zhǐ, an iris-like fragrant herb) used in real given names like Tsz-Ching and Tsz-Yan; a genuine cross-language floral echo
Keep exploring
Names like Iris · Middle names for Iris · Greek baby names · Dual-language baby names · Chinese American baby names · Short names
Does Iris fit YOUR family?
nametree reads your family’s names and finds the ones that belong. Free, private, no ads.
Add Iris to your family’s tree →