'apiose' originates from New Latin, specifically the word 'Apium', where 'Apium' referred to the plant genus (celery/parsley) from which the sugar was first isolated, and the suffix '-ose' was used to denote a sugar.

'apiose' was coined in the late 19th century from New Latin 'Apium' + the chemical suffix '-ose' and was adopted into scientific English to name the sugar isolated from plants of the Apiaceae (the celery/parsley family).

Initially the name indicated the source (derived from 'Apium'), but it evolved to denote the specific chemical entity — a branched-chain pentose sugar with a defined structure.