Inger
Meaning and origin
Contraction of Ingegerd and also a dialectal form of Ingrid. First recorded in Sweden in 1561.
Source: Wiktionary, Swedish entry for Inger (CC BY-SA 4.0).
Popularity in Sweden
Among newborns, Inger has been falling over the last few years. Its best year between 1998 and 2022 was 2013. The figures are for this exact spelling; other spellings of the name are counted on their own.
Years with fewer than two babies (fewer than ten before 2004) show as zero in the chart and as – in the table.
Show the figures
| Year | Girls |
|---|---|
| 1998 | – |
| 1999 | – |
| 2000 | – |
| 2001 | – |
| 2002 | – |
| 2003 | – |
| 2004 | – |
| 2005 | – |
| 2006 | 3 |
| 2007 | – |
| 2008 | 2 |
| 2009 | – |
| 2010 | – |
| 2011 | 2 |
| 2012 | – |
| 2013 | 4 |
| 2014 | 3 |
| 2015 | 3 |
| 2016 | 3 |
| 2017 | 3 |
| 2018 | 3 |
| 2019 | – |
| 2020 | – |
| 2021 | 4 |
| 2022 | 2 |
Everyone registered in Sweden on 31 December with this as the first name they use.
Show the figures
| Year | Women and girls |
|---|---|
| 1999 | 45,424 |
| 2000 | 45,076 |
| 2001 | 44,721 |
| 2002 | 44,358 |
| 2003 | 43,988 |
| 2004 | 43,610 |
| 2005 | 43,195 |
| 2006 | 42,779 |
| 2007 | 42,373 |
| 2008 | 41,934 |
| 2009 | 41,531 |
| 2010 | 41,009 |
| 2011 | 40,527 |
| 2012 | 39,966 |
| 2013 | 39,360 |
| 2014 | 38,757 |
| 2015 | 38,121 |
| 2016 | 37,441 |
| 2017 | 36,706 |
| 2018 | 35,955 |
| 2019 | 35,150 |
| 2020 | 34,316 |
Inger in a sentence
- Hej! Jag heter Inger.Hi! My name is Inger.
- Inger har bott i Uppsala i tre år.Inger has lived in Uppsala for three years.
- Vet du om Inger kommer på festen på lördag?Do you know if Inger is coming to the party on Saturday?
- Ingers mamma är lärare.Inger's mum is a teacher.
Swedish shows possession with a plain -s and no apostrophe: Ingers mamma is Inger's mum.
More names
Questions about Inger
How do you pronounce Inger in Swedish?
Press Listen at the top of the page to hear Inger from a native speaker's recording.
What does the name Inger mean?
Contraction of Ingegerd and also a dialectal form of Ingrid. First recorded in Sweden in 1561.
How popular is Inger in Sweden?
2 babies were named Inger in 2022. In 2020, 34,316 people in Sweden had Inger as the first name they go by. Among newborns the name has been falling lately and peaked in 2013 in the years SCB covers (1998–2022).
Popularity figures: Statistics Sweden (SCB), name statistics (BE0001) from the Statistical Database, released as open data under CC0. Each spelling is counted as its own name, as SCB does. SCB's open name statistics end with babies named in 2022 and the population on 31 December 2020; SCB stopped producing name statistics in 2024 and now points to the Swedish Tax Agency (Skatteverket) for newer figures.
Origins, IPA and recordings: Wiktionary (CC BY-SA 4.0), via kaikki.org; recordings from Lingua Libre on Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA). Lingolib is not affiliated with SCB or Wiktionary. Sources last checked 7 October 2026.