The gender of a baby can be found out at different stages during pregnancy, depending on the method used:
- The most common and reliable method is an anatomy scan ultrasound, typically performed around 18 to 22 weeks of pregnancy, often around the 20-week mark. This scan checks the baby's development and can often reveal the gender if the baby is positioned well and the sonographer is experienced.
- Earlier clues can come from an ultrasound using the "nub theory" at around 11 to 13 weeks, where the angle of the genital tubercle (nub) is analyzed. Accuracy gets better with time, with about 70% accuracy at 11 weeks and nearly 100% by 13 weeks.
- Non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) through blood tests can identify fetal DNA circulating in the mother's blood and determine gender as early as 6 to 10 weeks with very high accuracy (around 99.9%).
- More invasive and definitive tests such as amniocentesis and chorionic villus sampling (CVS) can determine the baby's sex with certainty earlier in pregnancy but are generally done for medical reasons rather than just gender identification.
In summary, the earliest you can find out the baby's gender is around 6 weeks by blood test, and more commonly at 18-22 weeks by ultrasound. Ultrasound gender determination before 20 weeks is possible but may depend on fetal position and technician skill.
