Cyberpunk Names: Street Handles, Corporate Aliases, and Everything In Between
Cyberpunk naming is its own art form. Unlike traditional fantasy — where names lean on Tolkien-esque phonetics — cyberpunk names pull from a chaotic mix of real-world cultures, tech jargon, street slang, and corporate sterility. The best ones tell you something about the character before a single line of dialogue.
What Makes a Name Feel Cyberpunk
The genre has a distinct naming DNA. Here's what separates a good cyberpunk name from a generic sci-fi one:
- Cultural blending: Cyberpunk worlds are globalized to the extreme. Japanese-English mashups (Ono-Sendai, Chiba City) are a genre staple since Gibson, but you'll also find Russian, Spanish, Mandarin, and Hindi woven into the naming fabric. A character named Wakako Okada or Viktor Vector feels right because the setting demands multiculturalism.
- The street name vs. real name divide: Most cyberpunk characters have two identities — their birth name and the handle they're known by. Johnny Silverhand isn't on anyone's birth certificate. This duality is baked into the genre.
- Tech as texture: Netrunner handles lean into digital aesthetics — glitch references, file extensions, numerical substitutions. But it's seasoning, not the whole dish. "zer0cool" works. "XxHacker_Lord_9000xX" doesn't.
- Class warfare in the syllables: Corporate names are polished and multi-syllabic (Adrienne Kaplan, Kenji Moriyama). Street names are blunt (Brick, V, Dex). The name itself signals where someone sits in the power structure.
Naming by Character Archetype
Your character's role in the world should directly shape their name. A netrunner and a street samurai exist in different realities even when they're in the same city.
- Netrunners and hackers live behind handles. Their names are digital-first — built to look good in a terminal, typed fast during a breach. Keep them short, techy, slightly cryptic. Think daemon.exe, not David the Hacker.
- Street samurai often carry Japanese-influenced names (a nod to the genre's roots in 1980s Japan-anxiety). Single-word handles work well — they're quick to say, quick to remember, quick to fear.
- Corporate agents need names that could appear on a business card at a Zurich-Orbital board meeting. Clean, international, maybe hyphenated. The uncanny perfection is the point — these people have been polished down to their names.
- Fixers are known by one name. Always. Padre, Rogue, Dex — fixers brand themselves because reputation is their inventory. Give them something smooth and memorable.
- Nomads carry road dust in their names. Compound names, clan identifiers, nature-meets-machine imagery. Dakota Storm-Runner says more about a character than a paragraph of backstory.
The Gibson Influence
William Gibson basically invented the cyberpunk naming playbook. A few patterns from his work that still hold up:
- Real-world names in unreal contexts: Case, Molly, Armitage — ordinary names doing extraordinary work. Gibson understood that grounding characters in normal names makes the chrome and neon hit harder.
- Japanese corporate culture as backdrop: Zaibatsus, keiretsu — Gibson's fascination with Japanese corporate power shaped how the entire genre handles Asian names and terminology.
- Place as name: Characters named after locations or brands (Wintermute, Neuromancer) blur the line between person and product. Very cyberpunk.
Common Mistakes to Avoid
A few traps that make cyberpunk names fall flat:
- Too many numbers and symbols: l33tspeak is fine in small doses, but "Sh4d0w_Bl4d3_X7" reads like a 2005 Xbox gamertag, not a cyberpunk character. One substitution is stylish. Five is a password.
- Generic "dark future" vibes: Names like "DarkBlade" or "NightStrike" could be from any genre. Cyberpunk names should feel specifically urban, techy, and culturally layered.
- Ignoring the cultural mix: An all-English cast in a cyberpunk city feels wrong. The genre's soul is multicultural — lean into it.
- Making every name a handle: Not everyone goes by a street name. Corporate characters, nomads, and civilians use real names. The contrast between "V" and "Hanako Arasaka" is what makes both names work.
Tips for Game Masters and Writers
If you're building a cyberpunk world — whether for a tabletop campaign, a novel, or a video game mod — names do heavy lifting for worldbuilding:
- Mix naming conventions by district: The corporate arcology has different naming energy than the combat zone. Let your names reflect geography.
- Give NPCs one memorable detail in their name: "Fingers" the ripperdoc. "Padre" the fixer. One-word names with strong imagery are perfect for supporting characters.
- Save full names for important characters: A three-part name signals importance. Use them sparingly so they land harder.
If you're also building out sci-fi characters beyond cyberpunk, our alien name generator handles non-human species, while the Fallout name generator covers post-apocalyptic naming with a different retro-future flavor.
Using the Generator
Pick your character type first — it's the most important filter. A netrunner handle and a corporate alias come from completely different worlds. Then use tone to dial in the feel: edgy for combat-focused characters, elegant for corp types, playful if you want genre-aware humor. The gender filter works differently here than in traditional name generators — in cyberpunk, handles often intentionally obscure gender, so "unisex" gives you the most genre-authentic results for street-level characters.
