Did You Know?
- The fa'asamoa — the Samoan way — is one of the most intact traditional cultures in the Pacific. It governs everything from how families are organized (the extended family unit called the aiga) to how names and titles are given and held.
- Gagana Samoa uses just 14 letters — a, e, f, g, i, l, m, n, o, p, s, t, u, v — and a glottal stop (') called the fa'uta'i. The glottal stop completely changes meaning: dropping the apostrophe in a name like Fa'aalofa creates a different word entirely.
- Christianity arrived in Samoa in 1830 with the missionary John Williams and transformed Samoan naming within a generation. Today, roughly 99% of Samoans identify as Christian, and Biblical names phonetically adapted to Samoan sounds — Sione (John), Malia (Mary), Petelo (Peter), Tevita (David) — are among the most common names on the islands.
Samoan names are given names drawn from Samoan words, Samoan spellings of Bible and European names, and the hereditary matai titles that families confer on their chiefs. This page lists 37 attested ones with the meanings the sources give, and, unlike the Hawaiian and Tongan lists, it separates a birth name from a title so you do not hand a chief's title to a child.
It also covers the questions behind the searches: what Samoan Bible names look like, what counts as a first name, and how the generator above keeps its output in Samoan spelling.
Samoan Given Names From Everyday Words
These names are ordinary Samoan or wider Polynesian words used as personal names. Where a source labels only the word and not the name, the meaning below is the word's.
| Alofa | "Love"; used for girls and boys (Behind the Name) |
| Ata | "Morning, dawn"; Samoan and Māori, used for girls and boys |
| Manu | "Bird" in several Polynesian languages; a boy's name |
| Moana | "Ocean, wide expanse of water, deep sea"; used for girls and boys |
| Tui | "Chief, king" in Fijian, Samoan and Tongan; a boy's name |
| Toi | Male name of Polynesian origin (Wiktionary) |
| Lagi | The Samoan word for "sky" and "heaven"; from Proto-Polynesian *laŋi |
| Sina | The Samoan word for "white" and, of hair, "grey" |
| Tai | The Samoan word for "tide"; from Proto-Polynesian *tai, "sea" |
Samoan Bible Names and Other Adapted Forms
Samoan has no native sound for most letters in English and Hebrew names, so missionaries and translators respelled them. Christianity was formally introduced with London Missionary Society missionaries in August 1830, and the first complete Samoan Bible, the Tusi Pa'ia, appeared in 1862.
| Sione | Samoan and Tongan form of John; a boy's name |
| Tavita | Samoan form of David; a boy's name |
| Mele | Samoan, Tongan and Hawaiian form of Mary; a girl's name (also "song" in Hawaiian) |
| Sakaria | Samoan spelling of Zachariah |
| Siaosi | Male name from English George (Wiktionary) |
| Viliamu | Samoan spelling of William |
| Salesi | Samoan spelling of Charles |
| Salata | Samoan spelling of Charlotte |
| Semisi | Samoan spelling of James |
| Oliva | Male name from English Oliver (Wiktionary) |
Matai Titles and Chiefly Names
A matai title is a family office, not a birth name. These are titles, and the holders named in Wikipedia's articles, so each is a real name used in public life.
| Malietoa | One of the four paramount titles; "great warrior," from the words "Mālie toa, mālie tau" |
| Tupua Tamasese | Paramount title; Tupua is the older name, Tamasese comes from a later holder |
| Tui Atua | A title held by Tupua Tamasese Efi alongside Tupua Tamasese |
| Mata'afa | Title borne by Mata'afa Iosefo and Fiame Naomi Mata'afa |
| Fiame | Title in the name of Fiame Naomi Mata'afa |
| Tuilaepa | Title in the name Tuilaepa Aiono Sailele Malielegaoi |
| Va'aletoa | Title in the name Va'aletoa Sualauvi II |
| Tuala | Title borne by several listed Samoans, including Tuala Falenaoti Tiresa Malietoa |
| Le Mamea | Title borne by Le Mamea Matatumua Ata and Le Mamea Ropati |
| Le Tagaloa | Title borne by Le Tagaloa Pita and Aiono Fanaafi Le Tagaloa |
| Aiono | Title borne by Aiono Nonumalo Sofara |
| Sua | Title borne by Sua Rimoni Ah Chong and Sua Sulu'ape Paulo II |
| Tu'u'u | Title borne by Tu'u'u Ieti Taulealo |
| Tanumafili | Second name of Malietoa Tanumafili I and II (head of state 1962 to 2007 for the second) |
| Laupepa | Malietoa Laupepa, title holder 1875 to 1898 |
| Vai'inupo | Malietoa Vai'inupo, who accepted Christianity from the London Missionary Society |
| Taia'opo | Malietoa Taia'opo, the only female Malietoa known to history |
| Efi | Personal name of Tui Atua Tupua Tamasese Efi |
Wikipedia states that Samoa has more than 25,000 matai, about five per cent of them women, and that only paramount chiefs have held the head of state office.
What the Generator Does Differently
The generator's instructions fix three rules that models tend to break. The glottal stop stays as an apostrophe (Fa'aalofa, not Faaalofa and not Fa-aalofa), every name ends in a vowel, and a matai title appears bare, with no "Chief" in front.
With no style chosen, a batch of five holds at least three plain given names, at most one matai title and at most one diaspora blend. The Name Style field switches this: Christian / Biblical gives Samoan spellings of Bible names, Matai / Chiefly Title gives titles, and Nature / Ocean gives sea, sky and plant words.
Writing Samoan Names Correctly
The glottal stop is a letter. Wikipedia's Samoan language article gives the pair mai, "from," and ma'i, "sickness," to show that dropping it changes the word. It counts fifteen letters in the alphabet proper, including the glottal stop, with h, k and r appearing only in loanwords.
- Keep the apostrophe in names such as Va'aletoa and Mata'afa
- Treat a title as one that someone holds, not a name given at birth
- Check a Bible name against its Samoan spelling, such as Tavita for David
- Hand a paramount title like Malietoa to a minor character
- Swap in Hawaiian or Tongan spellings; Mele and Sione are shared, but the languages differ
- End a made-up name on a consonant
For neighbouring traditions, try the Polynesian name generator for regional names or the Tongan name generator, since Tonga shares Sione and Mele.
Common Questions
What are common Samoan Bible names?
The forms confirmed here are Sione (John), Tavita (David), Mele (Mary), Sakaria (Zachariah), Viliamu (William), Salesi (Charles) and Semisi (James). Each is a Samoan respelling that avoids sounds the language does not use. I could not confirm Samoan forms for other Bible names such as Peter or Moses in the sources loaded, so they are not listed.
What is a typical Samoan first name?
First names come from Samoan words (Alofa, Ata, Moana), from respelled Bible or European names (Sione, Tavita, Siaosi), or from family naming. Many Samoans also hold a matai title as a separate formal name later in life.
Can the Samoan name generator make names for boys, girls or either?
Yes. Pick a gender and a Name Style, and each result states its meaning, tradition and usual gender. Names like Alofa, Ata and Moana are recorded for girls and boys alike.
Sources
Updated October 2026: replaced the overview with 37 attested names and cited meanings, added Bible-form and matai tables, and corrected the population and religion figures.
