The nails of the fingers and toes begin to develop during the 3rd month as thickened areas of epidermis that appear on the tip of each digit. These areas, called nail fields, gradually migrate onto the dorsal surface of the digits. This migration explains the nerve supply of the nail region by the palmar (or plantar) nerves.
Each nail fold comes to be located in a shallow depression which is surrounded laterally and proximally by folds of epidermis called nail folds. The stratum germinativum of the proximal nail fold proliferates to form the nail matrix. The cells of the matrix become keratinized, flatten and consolidate into the compact nail plate. The nail plate grows distally into the epidermis of the nail fold. The deeper layers of epidermis of the nail fold (stratum basale and stratum spinosum) now constitute the nail bed. The stratum corneum and periderm of the epidermis completely cover the nail for sometime and are jointly called eponychium. In late fetal stage the eponychium disappears except at the nail base. The growing nails reach the tips of fingers by the 8th month and the tips of the toes by birth.