Two hundred and thirty names below, sorted by colour, pattern, Thai heritage, personality, sorority sets and jokes. Every Thai word carries its script, its romanisation and a meaning checked against a dictionary rather than invented. One rule runs through all of it: name the fish for what it does, not for what colour it happens to be this week.
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Why colour names age badly
Because a large share of the bettas sold today will not keep the colour you bought.
Koi, galaxy and anything sold as marble carry the mosaic pattern, and mosaic fish rewrite themselves. A solid red goes patchy black over a season, loses the black, gains a white face. The 2022 genetic survey compared 209 solid fish against 55 mosaic fish and found the trait polygenic, with the authors saying flatly that the underlying molecular basis has not been investigated. Nobody can tell you where a marble is heading. The marble gene page has the full argument.
So Scarlett on a koi is a name with a shelf life. Three practical ways round it:
- Name the behaviour instead. A fish that hangs upside down in the same anubias leaf every afternoon is Hammock, and it will still be Hammock in two years.
- Name the fin, not the pigment. Fin form is fixed at hatching. Crescent, Parasol and Fan all survive a colour change. Fin types has the vocabulary.
- Pick a name whose colour reference is loose enough to drift. Ember and Opal both stay plausible across a lot of repainting. Vermilion does not.
If your fish is a solid line from a breeder rather than a chain-store koi, none of this applies and you can call it Sapphire with a clear conscience.
Names by colour
Sixty names, arranged by the colour the fish is wearing today.
Red (10). Ruby, Ember, Cinder, Scarlett, Vermilion, Chili, Sriracha, Garnet, Rooibos, Mars.
Blue (10). Cobalt, Indigo, Sapphire, Delft, Azurite, Neptune, Cerulean, Denim, Bluebell, Prussian.
White, platinum and opaque (8). Opal, Alabaster, Pearl, Frost, Chalk, Blanco, Snowdrop, Platinum.
Black (8). Onyx, Soot, Obsidian, Vanta, Ink, Crow, Basalt, Licorice.
Yellow and orange (8). Saffron, Marigold, Turmeric, Apricot, Amber, Butterscotch, Clementine, Mustard.
Purple and pink (8). Mulberry, Fuchsia, Lilac, Amethyst, Plum, Magenta, Orchid, Damson.
Green, copper and metallic (8). Verdigris, Patina, Malachite, Absinthe, Copper, Bronze, Rust, Brass.
A note on the metallics. Green in a betta is usually structural rather than pigmented, produced by iridophores scattering light rather than by a green pigment, which is why the same fish reads teal under one lamp and bottle green under another. Iridescence explains the mechanism, and it is worth knowing before you commit to Malachite under a shop light.
Names by pattern and fin form
Sixteen, and these hold their meaning better than a colour does.
Pattern. Koi, Nishiki, Marble, Terrazzo, Galaxy, Nebula, Quasar, Mosaic, Confetti, Splatter, Dragon, Chainmail.
Fin form. Crescent, Parasol, Fan, Comet.
Chainmail and Dragon both point at the same thing, the thick opaque white scale layer that gives a dragon-scale betta its armoured look, which is covered on dragon scale. Crescent and Parasol suit a halfmoon, whose caudal opens to a flat half-circle. Comet suits a veiltail. Terrazzo is the honest name for what a marble actually looks like halfway through a repaint.
Thai and Siamese heritage names
Thirty words, each one checked before it went on the page.
Most betta name lists that claim Thai origins are guessing, and the guesses are often wrong. Every entry below carries its Thai script, a romanisation and a gloss taken from English Wiktionary’s Thai entries, which draw on the Thai Dictionary Project, the Royal Institute of Thailand and the LEXITRON lexical database. Where a word has several senses, the one given is the sense the name is meant to carry.
Worth knowing before you pick one: the Thai name for the fish itself is ปลากัด, from ปลา (fish) and กัด (to bite). Biting fish. The species was declared Thailand’s national aquatic animal on 5 February 2019, and plakat culture covers the six centuries behind that decision.
| Thai | Romanised | Meaning | Suits |
|---|---|---|---|
| แดง | Daeng | red | A solid red male |
| ดำ | Dam | black | Melano and black orchid lines |
| ขาว | Khao | white | Opaque and platinum fish |
| ฟ้า | Fa | sky; light blue | A pale blue, and it also carries a poetic sense of heaven |
| น้ำเงิน | Nam Ngoen | dark blue | Royal and steel blue |
| เงิน | Ngoen | silver; money | Platinum and silver fish |
| ทอง | Thong | gold | Gold and yellow, and a common Thai given name |
| เหลือง | Lueang | yellow | Mustard gas and yellow lines |
| ม่วง | Muang | purple, violet | Lavender and violet |
| ส้ม | Som | orange | Any orange fish |
| นิล | Nin | jet; deep black; a dark gemstone | A matte black melano |
| เพชร | Phet | diamond | A white or crystal-scaled fish |
| มณี | Mani | a red precious stone, loosely any gem | A jewelled-looking red |
| ทับทิม | Thapthim | ruby; pomegranate | Deep red |
| พลอย | Ploi | gem; precious stone | Anything that catches the light |
| แก้ว | Kaeo | crystal, glass; something precious | A clear-finned or cellophane fish |
| ดาว | Dao | star | Galaxy and speckled patterns |
| จันทร์ | Chan | the moon | A pale crescent-tailed fish |
| ไฟ | Fai | fire; light | A hot red or a fish with a temper |
| ลม | Lom | wind; breeze | A drifter |
| เมฆ | Mek | cloud | Grey and smoky marbles |
| ฝน | Fon | rain | Speckled and dappled fish |
| ทะเล | Thale | sea | Blue and turquoise |
| ราชา | Racha | king; ruler | The obvious one for a dominant male |
| เสือ | Suea | tiger; also bandit or outlaw | A striped or barred fish |
| ช้าง | Chang | elephant | A giant betta, and yes, also the beer |
| มังกร | Mangkon | dragon | A dragon-scale male |
| ขวัญ | Khwan | the spirit believed to stay with someone and protect them | A fish you are attached to |
| รัก | Rak | to love; beloved | A female, most often |
| ทิพย์ | Thip | celestial, divine | A show fish |
Place names work too, and they are less often mangled. Ayutthaya and Sukhothai were both Siamese capitals. Mekong, Chao Phraya, Ping, Wang, Yom and Nan are rivers, the Chao Phraya beginning where the Ping and the Nan meet at Nakhon Sawan and running 372 km to the Gulf of Thailand. Mahachai is the district that gave its name to Betta mahachaiensis, and Krabi to the Krabi endemics. Isaan is the northeast. Chatuchak is the Bangkok market where a great deal of the world’s ornamental betta trade still changes hands.
Names for a fighter
Eighteen, drawn from the tradition the species came out of rather than from a fantasy novel.
Muay, Ayutthaya, Sukhothai, Chaophraya, Mekong, Isaan, Krabi, Mahachai, Siam, Rama, Chatuchak, Khlong, Bantam, Cutlass, Gladius, Duelist, Sabre, Hussar.
Muay is มวย, Thai for boxing. Khlong is the canal system of the central plain, the same waterways the wild fish were pulled out of before anyone thought to breed them for colour. Rama is the regnal name of the Chakri kings, one of whom taxed betta fights in the 19th century.
One caution about this whole category. Naming a fish Gladius does not make it any more able to share a tank. Seriously Fish is blunt on the point: only a single individual can be kept per tank in most cases. Tank mates covers what the exceptions actually are.
Names by personality
Twenty-four, and this is the category that ages best, because temperament in this species is stable enough to hold a name.
Bruiser, Sulk, Diva, Loiter, Pest, Hermit, Snooze, Nudge, Bubbles, Scout, Ghost, Radar, Bandit, Tempest, Riot, Sunbeam, Whisper, Dozer, Gadfly, Chief, Rascal, Widget, Moxie, Fidget.
The reason these last: individual bettas differ from each other in boldness and aggression in ways that repeat across time and situation, which is the technical bar for calling something a personality trait rather than a mood. A fish that is Hermit in March is usually still Hermit in September. Betta personality and intelligence works through the evidence, and betta behavior covers which behaviours are normal and which mean trouble.
The honest way to use this list is backwards. Wait a fortnight. Watch the fish. Then name it.
Names for female bettas
Thirty. Females get short-changed on most name lists, which is odd given they are the half of the species you can keep in a group.
Juniper, Wren, Mabel, Persimmon, Marlowe, Sable, Tansy, Bellini, Peony, Nutmeg, Ivy, Willa, Clover, Pomelo, Saffi, Delta, Kestrel, Halcyon, Rosalind, Verbena, Etta, Bijou, Cricket, Fennel, Tulip, Roux, Maple, Suki, Noon, Prim.
Delta is a double meaning worth having: a river mouth, and a fin class one step below halfmoon. Female betta care covers what actually differs about keeping them, which is less than most people expect and more than nothing.
Sets for a sorority
Eight sets of four, because a sorority is easier to track when the names share a system.
- Spice rack. Cardamom, Clove, Anise, Paprika.
- Northern rivers. Ping, Wang, Yom, Nan.
- Weather. Gale, Squall, Monsoon, Drizzle.
- Card suits. Spade, Heart, Club, Diamond.
- Tea. Oolong, Genmai, Assam, Sencha.
- Gemstones. Zircon, Peridot, Topaz, Jasper.
- Bakery. Brioche, Focaccia, Challah, Ciabatta.
- Stars. Lyra, Vega, Cygnus, Carina.
The practical argument for a shared system is not aesthetic. A sorority needs individual monitoring, because hierarchy stress and targeted aggression show up as one specific fish going off food or losing fin, and you cannot report “the small pale one” to yourself reliably at nine at night. Names that sort into a set make a written log possible. Sorority tanks is honest about how often these fail and why.
Four is the number in each set above for a reason as well. A sorority under five fish tends to concentrate aggression on a single target. Read the sorority page before you buy anything.
Joke names
Twenty. Nobody needs permission for this section, but here it is anyway.
Moby, Jaws, Kraken, Leviathan, Godzilla, Fish Stick, Sushi, Nemo, Bubbles McGee, Sir Fin, Count Finula, Swim Shady, Fin Diesel, Admiral, Torpedo, Meatball, Gordon, Tiny, Beluga, Poseidon.
Tiny on a giant betta is the best of these. Giant betta covers what that form actually is, which is a real size class rather than marketing.
The one thing worth doing before you name it
Get the water right first.
A betta named on day one in an uncycled tank is a betta whose name you will remember for the wrong reason. The fish needs dechlorinated water, a heater holding the upper 70s Fahrenheit, and a filter it does not have to fight. Tank setup is the full build, how to cycle a tank is the part people skip, and acclimation covers the first hour.
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Then wait two weeks, watch what the fish does with its tank, and name it after that.
Related on this site
- Betta Personality and Intelligence: What Research Shows
- Betta Fish Behavior: What Normal Looks Like and What Is a Warning Sign
- The Marble Gene: Why Marble Bettas Change Pattern for Life
- Betta Color Morphs: Modern Catalog and Genetics
- Betta Fin Types: Halfmoon, Crowntail, Plakat, IBC Forms
- Plakat Culture: Thai Fighting Fish and the Regulatory History
- Female Betta Fish: Identification, Care, Housing, and Sorority Tanks
- Betta Sorority Tank: What It Takes and How It Fails
- Betta Tank Setup: A 5-Gallon Minimum Build, Step by Step