Zinnia is a flower name: the bright garden bloom was named by Linnaeus after the German botanist Johann Gottfried Zinn, so the name simply means "zinnia flower". It belongs to the newer wave of botanical names that followed Lily, Violet and Daisy, with a snappy Z that sets it apart. Zinnia stood at number 4647 in 2000 and has climbed year after year to number 1290 in 2025, its best rank yet.