Good alien names sound like they come from a real language, one a human mouth can only nearly manage: K'thik for a clicking hive species, Ulawae for an ocean world, Hums-at-Dawn for a being of pure energy. This alien name generator gives each kind of alien its own sound, and can add a role and a home.
Ten good alien names
All ten came from the generator, two or three from each kind of alien:
- Sk'trix: the apostrophe stands for a click, so it sounds like an insect.
- Queen-Voice X'trix of the Pale Comet: in a hive, your job is part of your name.
- Tr'kesh: short and harsh, for a soldier of the swarm.
- Ulawae: open vowels and no hard stops, as if it were spoken underwater.
- Deep-Singer Oliwaro of the Ninth Bloom: an aquatic name with a role and a home world.
- Hums-Beyond-Seven: an energy being named after what it does, not a sound.
- Lattice-Mind Remembers-in-Silence: a crystal intelligence with a title to match.
- Admiral Oryianthe: a long, Latin-sounding name for a galactic empire.
- Exarch Draianthe: an imperial rank borrowed from Byzantium, where an exarch governed a province.
- Senator Caelessa: for the politics behind the fleet.
How science fiction names its aliens
- Give a species its own sounds. Star Trek's Klingon was built as a real language by the linguist Marc Okrand, full of harsh sounds English rarely uses. Vulcan names follow a pattern too: men's often begin with S (Spock, Sarek), women's with T' (T'Pol).
- The apostrophe usually stands for a sound English doesn't write: a click, or a catch in the throat. Use it consistently and it means something; scatter it and it's decoration.
- Names humans can't say. Lovecraft called Cthulhu's name a human attempt at sounds no human throat could make. Some aliens in fiction just give humans a nickname to use instead.
- Names that are descriptions. Some fictional species name themselves with phrases, like a translated title. It's an easy way to make an alien feel truly different.
Four kinds of alien
- Insectoid or hive: hard clicks and buzzes, with an apostrophe for the click. K'rrak, Ts'zek.
- Aquatic: open vowels and liquid sounds, as if spoken underwater. Ulawae, Lioloa.
- Energy or crystal: beings who name themselves by what they do. Hums-at-Dawn, Folds-Through-Glass.
- Galactic empire: long, grand names for admirals and consuls. Velion, Sarianthe.
Building a species
- Pick a sound and stick to it. Every member of a species should sound related. Generate a batch, keep the ones that feel like one language, and bin the rest.
- Let the name show the body. A species with mandibles can't say m or b; a species that sings might have names in two tones.
- Give them a word for us. What an alien species calls humans says more about them than anything else.
- Give them a ship and a crew. Name their vessels with the Spaceship Name Generator, their machines with the Robot Name Generator, and the humans they meet with the Cyberpunk Name Generator.
Give their homeworld a name with the Planet Name Generator.