A baby gender predictor can be any tool, test or tale that can help a pregnant mother and her partner identify the gender of their baby. 'Am I having a boy or girl?' remains the one burning question for all newly appointed mothers and therefore finding a baby gender predictor suddenly becomes a real quest. Any mother will tell you that the moment you can cease to refer to your baby as 'it' and proudly say 'he' or 'she' instead, marks the true bond and the beginning of the relationship between you and your baby.

Before advances in science and technology there was no crystal clear way for a mother to know whether her growing bump was to be a gleeful girl or a bold and boisterous boy. Many cultures and traditions nevertheless filled this gap and nurtured a number of different beliefs and old wives' tales to predict the baby's gender. Lunar calendars and wedding rings on a string all have to compete with many more weird and wonderful ways to decide whether it is time to shop for pink or blue.

The arrival of ultrasound during the late 1950s literally created waves. Suddenly there was a 'magic torch' that could be shone straight into the womb, in fact directly into the private parts! As early as four months in to their nine month marathon, mothers were suddenly able to know their baby's gender. Ultrasound was probably the first commonly used scientific baby gender predictor. Ground-breaking indeed, but still suffering from one major flaw. Ultrasound is subjective. It does not give a clear as day, yes or no outcome. The doctor has to search for the presence or absence of male or female genital organs, and then make judgements on what is seen or not seen. Throw in an occassional obstructing umbilical cord or placenta and this baby gender predictor endeavor suddenly becomes a little more taxing and a little less scientific.

Enter chromosomal analysis. Your baby growing inside of you has actually been a girl or a boy since its very first day as an embryo in your fallopean tube. Think back to those high school biology classes and you will recall that the X sperm makes a girl and the Y sperm makes a boy. Whoever got to the egg first was the real baby gender predictor. Tucked away in the DNA of your baby within the 23rd chromosomal pairing is the clearest indicator of whether you are carrying a boy or a girl. An electron microscope will give a clear depiction of whether your child is XX for a girl or XY for a boy with over a 99% level of accuracy. But one question remains; how can we safely see a baby's DNA?

The solution to this conundrum is that your baby's DNA is not only present within your baby's body itself. Identical foetal DNA is also present within the amniotic fluid surrounding your baby, and also within the placenta. Furthermore, the latest baby gender predictor methods attempt to isolate baby DNA that is present within the mother's blood or urine. This now means that it is possible for some baby gender predictor products to identify the gender of your baby as early as six weeks into your pregnancy.