Royal, Prince and Princess were among the most commonly rejected baby names in the past six years.

The annual roll call of rejected names shows officials have rejected Royal 27 times, Prince 24 times and Princess 11 times since 2012.

Names were refused if they resembled an official rank or title, were excessively long, used numbers or symbols, or were offensive to a reasonable person.

Registrar-General of Births, Deaths and Marriages Jeff Montgomery says often the requests reflected the depth of feeling.

"Often it's families are wanting to name their newborn Prince or Princess because that's how they feel about them. But unfortunately it is an official title or it resembles an official title, so it's not approved, particularly if it's a first name.

"If it's a second or a third name then they will tend to be approved."

Among the 43 names Department of Internal Affairs officials rejected last year were Legion-King, Prince-Pahata, Ida-Qween and Triple M, short for the Mighty Mongrel Mob.

Also making an appearance were the Roman numerals II, III, and X and the use of a dot in a name, similar to that which appears in email addresses.

Jeff says people also tried multiple versions of spelling a name, thinking they can trick officials, but if it sounds like a title or resembled a title it may be turned down.

Last year that included Jahstice, Priince and Royall.

"We ask the family why they've chosen a particular name and if there's a good reason, it may be accepted. But if there's not a reason and it links to activities that would generally be considered offensive by the general public then it won't be accepted.

"The vast majority are approved immediately, some get looked at personally by me and still get approved and some we talk to the parents and we come up with a solution that will work. Sometimes it's just a matter of changing the order of the names."

He says King was a good example.

"Often King is a family name and the parents will want to keep the name going through the family.

"We'll discuss that and often it will be approved and sometimes even as a first name, if previous relatives have had King as a first name, then it may well be approved for a child.

"But we'll discuss that with the parents, look back through our records and make a decision."

Jeff says with 60,000 births a year, having 43 names rejected - about one a week - meant a very low number were turned down.