Cookies
Every cookie this site sets, what it does and how long it lasts. Four are ours and make the site work; the last belongs to Google Analytics, which counts visits.
The first four cookies below make the site work: signing in, protecting forms, and remembering your shortlist and shared lists. The last is set by Google Analytics, which tells us how many people visit and which pages they read, so we know what to improve. There is no advertising on the site, and no advertising cookies.
You can block the analytics cookies in your browser, or switch Google Analytics off everywhere with Google's opt-out add-on, and every part of the site keeps working.
babynamesio_session
Keeps you signed in and ties a form you submit to the browser that opened it.
XSRF-TOKEN
Proves a request came from a page we served, so nobody can act in your name from another site.
bn_shortlist
The code of the list you are working on, so your saved names are there when you return without an account.
bn_lists
Which shared lists you are on, so you can be on several at once and be recognised as the right person on each.
Google Analytics
Set by Google Analytics so a returning visit is not counted as a new person. It tells us how many people visit and which pages they read.
What Happens If You Block Them
Reading the site works perfectly well without cookies — every name page, every list, the search and the meanings. What stops working is anything that has to remember you between clicks: saving a name, swiping a deck, and being recognised as the right person on a shared list. Those are not degraded, they simply cannot function, because there is nowhere to keep the answer.
You can clear our cookies at any time in your browser. Clearing bn_shortlist and
bn_lists detaches this browser from any anonymous list it was holding, which is
also the quickest way to walk away from one entirely.
Local Storage and Similar
We do not use local storage, session storage or fingerprinting, and Google Analytics is the only script from another company on the site. The cookies above are the whole of it.
Questions
Email [email protected]. For what we store on our side rather than in your browser, see Privacy.
Last updated 15 September 2026.