1,500 Baby Names and Counting: What I Learned Building a Multilingual Name Database

We just crossed 1,500 baby names on BabyNamePick.com — covering 30+ origins from Irish to Japanese to Polynesian. Here's what I learned building a multilingual name database from scratch. The Challenge Most baby name sites focus on English names. But parents today come from everywhere, and they want names that reflect their heritage. We set out to build a database that covers: Western European : Irish, British, French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Nordic & Celtic : Nordic, Scottish, Welsh, Cornish Eastern European : Russian, Slavic, Polish, Czech Middle Eastern : Arabic, Hebrew, Persian, Turkish South Asian : Indian, Sanskrit East Asian : Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Thai African : Pan-African names from multiple traditions Pacific : Hawaiian, Polynesian, Filipino Americas : American, Latin American Data Structure Each name entry looks like this: { "name" : "Akira" , "meaning" : "Bright and clear" , "origin" : "japanese" , "gender" : "unisex" , "styles" : [ "classic"