Ship name generator

Percy Jackson and Annabeth Chase, welded after the hard c of Percy. It is the cleanest classic cut in wide use: four letters in front, a whole syllable behind, and nobody needs telling how to say it.

Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger. Only two letters of Ron survive, which is enough because the o carries him, and Hermione arrives almost whole. Short first names give up more than long ones do.

Bellamy and Clarke from The 100. The seam falls on a consonant meeting a consonant, which usually reads badly, but ll and cl are both legal openings so the join passes without a stumble.

Klaus and Caroline in The Vampire Diaries. Klaus keeps its whole opening cluster and Caroline gives up only its first letter, so the result is long, and long is right when both names are already soft.

Zuko and Katara in Avatar. Two letters from each end and the a of Katara doing the work in the middle. It is the shortest blend on this list and still unmistakable, which is why it outlived the show.

Katara and Aang, the same series and the opposite decision. The double a at the seam would be a fault anywhere else and here it is the whole joke, because Aang refuses to be shortened.

Will Solace and Nico di Angelo. The blend reaches past the first names into a surname, which is what you do when two given names refuse to weld. Sol and angelo also happen to mean sun and angel.

Jon Snow and Daenerys Targaryen. Jon arrives whole, which a three letter name is allowed to do, and Daenerys hands over its last two syllables. The y keeps it from ending flat.

Gendry and Arya. The seam elides: Gendry ends on y and Arya begins on a, so one letter is dropped rather than doubled. Every hand made ship name does this without thinking about it.

Magnus Bane and Alec Lightwood in Shadowhunters. Two letters and three letters, and it still reads as a word. Very short blends work when both names have a hard consonant to lean on.

Dean and Castiel in Supernatural. Three letters from one, five from the other, and the seam sits exactly where the two vowel sounds change. It is the most copied smoosh in fandom for a reason.

Draco and Harry. Dr plus arry, with the r doing double duty at the join. The result keeps the whole rhythm of Harry while announcing Draco in the first two letters.

Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes. St is not a syllable and a blender will not cut there, which is the point: a person heard it and a machine would not have. Hand cutting beats automatic cutting often.

Rey and Kylo Ren. Rey arrives whole because there is nothing to cut off a three letter name, and Kylo gives up its opening. Five letters, two syllables, impossible to mishear.

Clarke and Lexa in The 100. The x is what makes it work: a rare letter in the middle of a blend fixes it in the memory far better than another soft consonant would.

Zuko and Sokka. The double k at the seam is deliberate, not an accident of the cut, and it is what stops the name collapsing into Zuka and losing Sokka altogether.

Natsu and Lucy from Fairy Tail. Two letters each, four in total, and it is still said out loud at conventions. A blend this short only survives when both halves open on a strong consonant.

Harry and Ginny. One letter from Harry, four from Ginny, and the h is the only thing carrying him. Short blends can be lopsided as long as the surviving letter is the distinctive one.

Brienne of Tarth and Jaime Lannister. Br plus aime, and the seam falls where Jaime already changes sound, so the join is invisible when you say it rather than read it.

Betty and Jughead in Riverdale. One letter of Betty, six of Jughead. It is the extreme end of a smoosh, and it works only because Jughead is unusual enough to survive being nearly whole.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, and the blend that taught the press to do this at all. Three letters from him, seven from her, ending on a vowel, which is why it was easy to say on television.

Ben Affleck and Jennifer Lopez. Ben arrives whole and Jennifer loses only its opening j. It is the rare couple name that got used twice, years apart, for the same two people.

Kim Kardashian and Kanye West. Both names begin with k, so the blend had to take one of them whole or lose the pair entirely. Kim survives; Kanye is reduced to its last syllable.

Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce. Tay plus vis, and it beat every rival blend because it is three letters shorter than any of them. Speed of typing decides which version of a couple name sticks.

Justin Bieber and Selena Gomez. One letter of Justin, five of Selena, and the result is a real first name in several languages, which is the best thing that can happen to a couple blend.

Zayn Malik and Perrie Edwards. Ze plus rrie, and the double r is inherited rather than made at the seam. Ending on ie rather than a is what makes a blend read as affectionate.

Tom Holland and Zendaya. Tom arrives whole and Zendaya gives up its first syllable, which is unusual: normally the second name keeps its ending, not its middle.

Zac Efron and Vanessa Hudgens. One letter from him, six from her. A single distinctive letter at the front is enough when it is a z, and would not have been enough with an s.

Shawn Mendes and Camila Cabello. Shaw plus mila, welded on the m. It sounds like a place name, which is common with four syllable blends and is not a fault.

Virat Kohli and Anushka Sharma. Three letters and five, and the shk cluster in the middle survives intact because Anushka already carried it. Nothing at the seam is doing anything difficult.

Bakugo and Deku in My Hero Academia. Two whole syllables from each side, nothing sliced through the middle of a sound. Four syllable blends are normal in anime fandom and rare everywhere else.

Kageyama and Hinata in Haikyuu. Kage and hina are both real units of the original names, which is why the blend is readable to somebody who has never seen either name written down.

Bokuto and Akaashi. The seam puts u against a, two vowels meeting, which usually fails. It survives here because Akaashi already opens on a vowel and the pause is expected.

Naruto and Hinata. Naru and hina, and both halves keep their stress. Swap the order and you get Hinaruto, which nobody says, so the order of a syllable blend is not free.

Sasuke and Sakura. Two names that begin with the same syllable, which is the hardest case: the blend has to keep sasu and saku distinct or it collapses into one repeated sound.

Eren and Mikasa in Attack on Titan. Ere and mika, and the blend loses the end of both names rather than the middle, which is what keeps it from sounding like a typo of either one.

Kacchan and Ochako. The nickname is used rather than the given name, which is a decision no automatic blender can make for you, and it is what makes this one land.

Todoroki and Momo. Todo and momo, four syllables, all of them open on a consonant and close on a vowel. It scans like a drum pattern, which is exactly why it is easy to remember.

Adrien and Marinette in Miraculous. Adrien arrives whole and only the ette of Marinette follows, so the join is a suffix rather than a weld. Long names often blend best this way.

Marinette and Chat Noir. Mari plus chat, using the hero name rather than the civilian one. Fandoms often keep a second blend for the same two people under different names.

Remus Lupin and Sirius Black. Not a letter of either first name survives. It is built from what the names MEAN, a wolf and a star, and no blender will ever find it for you.

Spock and Kirk. The cut lands on sp, which is not a syllable and which an automatic blender refuses on principle, because cutting there usually stacks consonants. Here it works.

Caitlin Snow and Barry Allen. A surname welded to a first name. When two given names refuse to blend, look at the other half of both names before giving up on the pair.

James and Lily. One letter of James, and the result is a real word already. Automatic cutting will not hand you a single letter front, so this is a hand cut by definition.

Stiles and Derek in Teen Wolf. St plus erek, the same trick as Stucky and the same reason it is not automatic: st carries no vowel, so no cut rule proposes it.

Stiles and Lydia. The same front, a different back, and the two ship names sit side by side in the same fandom without being confused. A consistent front is worth keeping.

Keith and Lance in Voltron. One letter of Keith opening a name that is otherwise entirely Lance, and the k changes the whole sound of the word it is stuck to.

Shiro and Keith, the same fandom and the same first letter trick, doubled: sh from one, eith from the other. Two blends of the same character have to differ in their first sound.

Princess Bubblegum and Marceline in Adventure Time. Bubbl plus ine, cutting a compound word rather than a name. Titles and epithets blend as happily as given names do.

Supergirl and Lena Luthor, by way of her company. Neither first name appears at all. When a pairing is defined by what the two characters do, the blend usually follows that instead.