Colby is a distinctive girls' name in England & Wales, ranking #1970 in 1999 with 8 recorded births. The name reached its all-time peak in 1997 with 8 births ranking #1958. Since 1996, the popularity has increased by 60.0%. In 1999, approximately 1 in every 35,212 girls born was named Colby. FALLING Recent data shows the name is currently falling.
Colby is an English surname-style name with a light, approachable sound. The older place-name meaning is less central to modern use than the name's friendly, sporty feel.
Like many names of its type, Colby entered first-name use through surname tradition and later settled into mainstream naming. It has a very late twentieth-century American profile.