Idiosyncratic Ship Naming

Identifying a ship with both characters' names is functional but often not catchy, and even Portmanteau Couple Names aren't always colorful enough for the purposes of shipping communities. Sometimes the names don't work together very well logistically either. Therefore, a lot of ships are named in ways that aren't obvious except to those familiar with all the intricacies of the work's fandom.

Usually, a word vaguely related to the two characters is combined with the suffix "-shipping" to create a name for the couple. The pattern "[surname] + cest" is commonly used for incestuous pairings.

Not related to idiosyncratic starship naming in The Culture.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Attack on Titan fandom, in a sort-of blend with Portmanteau Couple Name^*Springer being Connie's last name, Pringles being a stand-in for Sasha "Potato Girl" Blause, has taken to calling the pairing of Connie and Sasha "Springles."
• Code Geass:
  • The catchy name "Homolust" for Lelouch/Suzaku.
  • "Lamperougecest" is a name for Lelouch/Nunnally.
• Death Note has "the Handcuff Duo" or "Lawlight" for L x Light and M&M for Matt x Mello.
• Digimon Data Squad has Tomato for the Masaru/Tohma pairing.
• Eyeshield 21: Agon and Unsui are called A-Un when shipped together. Interestingly, the actual meaning behind A-Un is a religious and architectural one, so that just adds another weird layer to the term.
• Fullmetal Alchemist:
  • "Elricest" for Edward/Alphonse.
  • The Edward/Winry relationship, besides their usual portmanteau "EdWin", are also known as "503." This is a rather obscure reference to a Japanese brand of jeans of the same number that are produced by a company called Edwin. This name got so popular that it was even featured in the manga/anime at one point.
• The Japanese fandom of Hetalia: Axis Powers call Germany/N. Italy "Gnocchi".
  • There's also "the chick pair" for Prussia/Italy.
  • "Itacest" is used to refer to the fairly rare incest pairing of N.Italy and S.Italy. Some circles also refer to America and Canada as "Americest". In the latter case, a few fans dip a toe into the Harry Potter fandom (or at least, the North American side of it) and dub it Ilvermornian Incest.
  • "The communist pair"/"The Red Couple for Russia/China.
  • The "Germancest" pairing.
  • The Cold War pairing. Also known as Waiting for Spring, Mutually Assured Devotion, and Bering Strait (as in the strait between the far east of Russia and western Alaska).
  • The Special Relationship.
  • Austria/Prussia/Hungary is often called The Frying Pangle.
  • There's also Dover in the Japanese fandom for England/France (which in the Western fandom is usually called FrUK). The name refers to the Strait of Dover, the narrowest place to cross the Channel.
  • A bigger list here (although it does lack several names commonly seen at Pixiv).
  • Here's an extremely comprehensive list for pairing names used at Pixiv. There's a lot of idiosyncratic ship naming going on over there, to put it lightly (that site tends to go down at least once monthly when bandwidth is exceeded; if you happened to check it in this state, try the LiveJournal archive instead). Fun fact: some of the pairing names are based on Japanese language puns; for example, Turkey/Japan is called the "Weekend Couple" because their Japanese country names put side-by-side together can be literally translated as "weekend".
  • "Kimchiburger" for America/Korea and "the bunny pair" or "Snow Bunny" for Russia/Prussia.
• "Inucest" usually refers to Inuyasha/Sesshoumaru, but can also apply to any relationship in the series wherein both members are at least part dog youkai.
• Junjou Romantica uses this a lot, with the eponymous "Romantica" pairing being Misaki/Usagi. Note that these ship names are canon.
• Mobile Suit Gundam Wing combines Theme Naming with this trope, resulting in ship labels that look like they belong on an algebra test. Since most of the male cast uses Numerical Theme Naming, pairings will be written in the formula of YXZ, where Y and Z are the "number" or the first letter of the character's name — hence 1X2 for Heero/Duo and 1XR for Heero/Relena.
  • The order of the "name" is important too, sometimes determining how the characters act (1X2 is Heero/Duo acting as normal, 2X1 is mopey Duo and cheerful Heero) and sometimes denoting the more active party or the one who makes the first move (1XR means Heero instigates the relationship, RX1 means Relena does, 1XRX1 means they both go for each other).
• One of My Hero Academia's most popular ships is Green Tea, which pairs up Izuku Midoriya ("Midori" meaning "green") and Ochako Uraraka ("Ocha" meaning "tea").
  • There is also one called EraserDust. Eraser is obviously Eraserhead and dust coming from Shigaraki’s turning things to dust.
  • HotWings for Hawks and Endeavor
• Naruto:
  • There is Hyuugacest for Neji/Hinata pairings... may involve other Hyuuga members too, though.
  • Uchihacest for Itachi/Sasuke and Sandcest for any combination of the Sand Siblings.
  • Inuzukacest is the term of choice for those who ship Kiba and his sister Hana, or any other Inuzuka for that matter.
  • "Uzumakicest" is a thing. It was revealed that Karin is an Uzumaki, though we don't know how closely she is related to Naruto. The possibility that she is his first cousin (or even his aunt, considering that the Uzumaki's long lifespans could also conceivably extend their reproductive years dramatically) has not been ruled out.
  • Naruto/Sakura or NaruSaku is also called "Heaven and Earth" due to a chapter of Naruto when Naruto is compared to Earth and Sakura was compared to Heaven and how both were needed to be whole.
• Ouran High School Host Club: "Hitachiincest" for Hikaru/Kaoru.
• Pokémon: The Series: The Pokémon fandom actually claims to have invented the "____Shipping" (with the blank space filled by a word or phrase that applies to both characters, or combines different aspects of them) trend. Given their records showing this form of ship naming in use as early as 1997 or 1998, even if they weren't the first to use it, they're certainly one of the first. It makes sense, as the first name of this type, Rocketshipping, was conceived as a pun on the term rocket ship. Most recently updated list here.
  • "RocketShipping", which pairs Jessie and James of Team Rocket.
  • The various shipnames involves the protagonist Ash Ketchum are Pokeshipping (Ash/Misty), Advanceshipping (Ash/May), Pearlshipping (Ash/Dawn), Negaishipping (Ash/Iris), Amourshipping (Ash/Serena), Aureliashipping (Ash/Lillie), Blueangelshipping (Ash/Lana), Journeyshipping (Ash/Goh), Bloomboltshipping (Ash/Chloe), Palletshipping (Gary/Ash), and Imaginationshipping (Ash/Bianca).
  • Other common names include Orangeshipping (Tracy/Misty), Contestshipping (Drew/May), Ikarishipping (Paul/Dawn), Egoshipping (Misty/Gary), and Wishfulshipping (Iris/Cilan).
  • At the beginning of the Pokémon fandom, the Ash/Misty relationship was referred to as "AAML" (acronym for "Ash and Misty Love"), a blend of Idiosyncratic and Portmanteau Couple Name. Similar versions were used for some other ships, such as JAJL for James/Jessie, and they lasted a while, but they eventually failed due to being associated with the more "immature" parts of the fandom and the rotating cast making the names confusing; the aformentioned AAML could be for either Ash and Misty or Ash and May.
• Similar to the fandom for the anime, the Pokémon Adventures fandom uses the "____Shipping" naming scheme. Franticshipping (Ruby/Sapphire), Oldrivalshipping (Green/Blue), and Specialshipping (Red/Yellow) come to mind. There are even ____ Shipping for OT3s, like Entourageshipping (Diamond/Pearl/Platinum).
• Pretty Cure:
  • Suite Pretty Cure ♪: SweetShipping (Hibiki/Kanade, due to Kanade being a baker).
  • Smile PreCure!:
    • The Nao x Reika ship were usually called as the "8:40", because back when the show was first aired, by sheer coincidence most episodes have a moment between the two of them exactly at/near the 8:40 mark, as collected in this picture.
    • The Nao x Akane ship is called the "Nissan Combination" because their Cure names (March for Nao, Sunny for Akane) just so happens to be the name of cars made by Nissan.
• The Prince of Tennis fandom typically uses "____ Pair" for ship names. For example: Golden Pair (the canon nickname), Silver Pair (Ohtori/Shishido), Dirty Pair (Mukahi/Oshitari), Data Pair (Inui/Renji), Ah-Un Pair (Momoshiro/Ryouma), etc.
• Puella Magi Madoka Magica has "Red x Blue" for Kyoko/Sayaka and "Tea Cake" for Mami/Charlotte.
• Reborn! (2004) characters' Goroawase Numbers often get used as ship names, leading to such things as 5927 (Goku/Tsuna). Even if you do know the fandom it's sometimes a bit tricky to work out.
• Saiyuki takes a page from Gundam Wing on the number front, the four main characters having their pairings broken down into numbers determined by their names (san = 3; go = 5; hachi = 8; kyu = 9), making two of the more prevalent couples 9x3 (Sanzo x Goku) and 5x8 (Gojyo x Hakkai).
• School Rumble — a giant Love Dodecahedron — naturally has a number of factions, mostly named after key scenes the characters shared. Eri/Harima is the "Flag Faction", because their interactions so often resemble "flag" events from Dating Sims. Yakumo/Harima is the "Onigiri Faction", because of the onigiri Yakumo offered to Harima. Other factions include the Kids Meal Faction (Eri/Yakumo/Harima), Oudou/"Correct Path" Faction (Tenma/Harima), True Oudou (Tenma/Karasuma), Flute Faction (Mikoto/Hanai), and Basketball Faction (Mikoto/Asou).
• In SHUFFLE!, three of the heroines have in-story fan clubs with patterned acronyms: KKK^note (not the Ku Klux Klan; it stands for Kitto Kitto Kaede, and in the dub, Knights of Kissing Kaede ("not the guys with the sheets!")) for Kaede, SSS^note (Suki Suki Sia/Sexy Sia Soldiers) for Sia, and RRR^note (Ran Ran Rin-chan/Rina's Randy Raiders) for Nerine. By extension, real-life fans who favor one of these heroines consider themselves members of her club. Other fans have created the AAA^note (Ai Ai Asa), the PPP^note (Puri Puri Primula), and even, God help us, the III^note (Ikiru Ikiru Itsuki). Since someone who likes one heroine the best will usually think she deserves to get Rin, these double as names for the 'ships.
• Spy X Family: Aside from the Portmanteau Couple Name of Twiyor, Loid and Yor have the more esoteric ship name of "Twilight Princess".
• ×××HOLiC: Doumeki/Watanuki is usually rendered as "Donuts", presumably as a portmanteau of Doumeki, Watanuki, and "go nuts" (alternatively, it's because the rampant Ho Yay of the series makes them seem about as straight as donuts).
  • Also 104.
• Yu-Gi-Oh!: Ever since the beginning. Here is a gigantic list with over 500 pairings for Duel Monsters alone, and here is a link that has a shipping list for each of the spinoffs. One of the reasons it's managed to stick around is the heavy use of Dub Name Change, Inconsistent Spelling, and in the case of the original series, alternate identities or incarnations of the same character, which means that "Yugi/Joey", "Yugi/Jounouchi", "Yuugi/Jonouchi" "Yami Yugi/Joey", "Yami Yugi/Jounouchi" "Dark Yugi/Jounouchi", and "Yami no Yuugi/Jonouchi" are all valid names for just two different pairings (Wishshipping for the former three, Dragonshipping for the latter four).
  • Some of the earliest examples: Puzzleshipping (Yugi/Yami Yugi), Rivalshipping (Kaiba/Yugi), Prideshipping (Kaiba/Yami Yugi), Peachshipping (Anzu/Yugi), Revolutionshipping (Anzu/Yami Yugi), Azureshipping (Kaiba/Anzu), etc.
  • In general, all shipnames make sense. Some are obvious, like Thiefshipping (Marik/Yami Bakura): Marik tries to steal rare cards, Bakura was a thief in the past.
    • Yu-Gi-Oh! The Abridged Series mentions Thiefshipping explicitly, and then starts beautifully indulging in it.
    • They also voiced a comic featuring the aptly named Psychoshipping (Yami Marik/Yami Bakura) which is less beautiful to indulge.
  • Sometimes you have to dig a bit deeper to make sense of the names. Like Danceshipping (Mai/Anzu): Anzu likes dancing, Mai's name means "dance". Or Silentshipping (Shizuka/Kaiba): Shizuka's name contains the kanji for "quiet", and Kaiba never says a single word to her, even when she directly addresses him. Contrast Screamshipping (Shizuka/Yami Marik).

Comic Books

• Spider-Man: Peter Parker and Mary Jane Watson are called "the Spider-Marriage" by many Spider-Man fans.

Fan Works

• Advice and Trust:
  • Shinji/Asuka/Rei is called the "Israfel Special", based off of a running gag whenever Asuka and Shinji bring up the Threesome Subtext between them and Rei.
  • Rei/Kaworu has several names: "TsundeReinbowTrout" (which doubles as a Portmanteau Couple Name of their Fan Nicknames), "Impact Shipping", and (very rarely) "The Forbidden Union".
  • Shinji/Asuka/Rei/Kaworu is called "PilOT4".
• In Child of the Storm and its sequel, one of the number of names Harry/Carol (so far not having gone further than UST and platonic cuddling until chapter 46 of the sequel) has generated is 'Magic Lantern', because Harry's a wizard and Carol is briefly the wielder of Alan Scott's Green Lantern Ring. (They also go by the portmanteau "Carry" — the two seem to be fairly interchangeable in the fandom.)
• While Incorrect Smash Bros Quotes mostly uses portmanteaus, two couples are identified this way: Dark Crown for Zelda/Dark Samus and Equilibrium for Galeem/Dharkon.
• Super RWBY Sisters has several In-Universe examples, which have been adopted by the fans as well, including:
  • Pit and Ruby: Rose Feathers.
  • Claude and Yang: Golden Flame.
  • Ilia and Mercedes: Blue Lizard.
  • Umber and Xena/Yagami are Lunartics.
  • Bea and Korrina are Skating Sweets.
• A Thing of Vikings:
  • The polycule of Sigurd/Sophia/Gunnar/Heidrun is a bit too big (4 people) to use a Portmanteau Couple Name, so some fans have taken to calling it the Constantinopolycule.
  • Eret/Cami/Merida is sometimes called the Eretrio.

Films — Animation

• Fans of The Bad Guys (2022) who ship Wolf and Snake together have taken to calling them FluffyVenom.
• The Book of Life:
  • The married, but estranged, couple Xibalba and La Muerte is referred to as "Gravepainters".
  • Manolo/Maria/Joaquin has been tentatively dubbed "Tres Leches".
  • Manolo/Maria is "Musical Hearts."
• Frozen (2013)'s fandom mostly uses Portmanteau Couple Names, but there are a couple exceptions:
  • The Elsa/Anna ship is usually known by the Portmanteau Couple Name Elsanna, but it's also known as Icest, or (less frequently) Wincest or Arencest. Platonically they're known as "Snow Sisters".
  • Pairing Hans and Elsa has been called "Iceburns", since she has ice powers and he has sideburns. If you want to get meta about it, the fandom sometimes likes depicting him as having fire powers in contrast to Elsa's ice powers so that could also represent "burns". Plus he's a bad guy and he hurts people, and burns hurt.
  • The rare pairings of Olaf/Sven and Olaf/Marshmallow have been referred to as Nosenoms and Snowship, respectively.
  • Crossover Ship Jack Frost/Elsa is called either Royalfrost, or SnowTP.
  • Elsa/Wreck-It Ralph is sometimes called Icebreaker.
• Shipping between the characters of Inside Out, when it comes to pairings between the emotions, mostly have names based on the shapes they were based off of. Some examples:
  • Starnerve for Joy and Fear
  • Brickstar for Anger and Joy
  • Rawcoli for Fear and Disgust
  • Tearbrick for Sadness and Anger
• Klaus: The ship of Klaus with Jesper is called "Merry Husbands".
• Moana and Maui shippers sometimes use Moaui or Mauna, but more popular is Hooked Wayfinder.
• My Little Pony: Equestria Girls: To distinguish it from the established ship between Sunset Shimmer and Friendship is Magic's Twilight Sparkle, the ship between Sunset and the Equestria Girls version of Twilight instead goes by "Sciset", a portmanteau based on the human Twilight's Fan Nickname of Sci-Twi.
• The Rise of the Guardians fandom is practically famous for this, and are astoundingly creative with their shipping names (most of them involving Jack Frost). The only usual shipping name of the bunch is Bennefrost (Jack/Jamie). The others include Frost Bite/Rainbow Snow Cone (Jack/Tooth), Sweet Tooth (Bunnymund/Tooth), Jack Rabbit/Snow Bunny (Jack/Bunnymund), Black Ice (Pitch/Jack), Cavity (Tooth/Pitch), White Christmas (North/Jack), Black Christmas (Pitch/North), Dark Chocolate/Rotten Eggs (Pitch/Bunnymund), Eggnog (Bunnymund/North), Dust Bunnies (Bunnymund/Sandman)...
• Spider-Man: Spider-Verse: Most ship names in the fandom come from taking one word, associating it with a character, and then putting the associated words together. For example, The Hero Miles Morales is linked to the word "flower" (in reference to his introduction in the first movie where he's singing the song "Sunflower"), and Gwen Stacy is linked with the word "ghost" (she has also gone by the name Ghost-Spider in the comics), making their ship name "Ghostflower".
  • The number of idiosyncratic names exploded after the release of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse. There's Punkflower/Flowerpunk (Miles Morales/Hobie Brown AKA Spider-Punk), Holofang (Miguel O'Hara AKA Spider-Man 2099/Lyla ^note "Holo" referring to her being an AI hologram and "fang" to his having them), Cyberflower/Byteflower/Flowerbyte (Miles/Margo Kess AKA Spider-Byte), Fangbike/Motorfang (Miguel/Jess Drew AKA Spider-Woman ^note the latter's associated words deriving from her means of transport), Riotflower (Miles/Ganke Lee ^note tying into Miles's word, Ganke's comes from a scene in Into where he listens to the song "Start a Riot"), Clawcode (Earth-42 Miles/Ganke^note the former from his clawed gauntlets and the latter due to his Earth-1610B counterpart spending most of his screentime at his computer), and many, many more.
  • The pairing for Hobie and Pavitr Prabhakar AKA Spider-Man India has three different names: Chaipunk, Goldenpunk, and Punkshine. In most ships, Pavitr is associated with the word "chai", due to a Brick Joke conversation in which he calls out the redundant nature of the phrase "chai tea". Some Hobie/Pavitr fans take issue with him being associated with this one conversation, leading to "golden" and "shine" being used in its place, in reference to his Nice Guy personality.
  • Some of the ships between the adult Spider-People have names idiosyncratic even by these standards. Miguel O'Hara/Peter B. Parker is known as "Spiderdads", Peter B. and Mary Jane Watson have the punny name of "PBMJ", and shipping Miguel/Peter B./Mary Jane has been referred to as "PBM&Ms".
  • Another idiosyncratic name is used for the Foe Yay Shipping pair of Earth-42 Miles/Earth-1610B Miles — Milescest.
• Strange Magic:
  • Butterfly Bog for Marianne and The Bog King because she's a fairy with butterfly wings.
  • Potionless for Sunny and Dawn. This is to reference that the two only fall in love without the use of a love potion.
• Tangled: The ship of Rapunzel and Eugene is called "New Dream," after his Dying Declaration of Love, "You were my new dream."
• Wreck-It Ralph:
  • Fans have taken to calling the pairing of Fix-It Felix, Jr. and Sergeant Calhoun "Hero's Cuties" as a play on words on Calhoun's video game of origin, "Hero's Duty".
  • The Wreck-it-Ralph/Vanellope Von Schweetz pairing is usually called "Jawbreakers", possibly as a reference to the scene where Ralph manages to crack open one of these giant, seemingly unbreakable candies.
  • Rancis/Gloyd is called "Peanut Butter Pumpkin", due to Rancis' theme being based around peanut butter cups and Gloyd's around mellowcreme pumpkins. For slightly more obvious reasons, Rancis/Vanellope is "Vanilla Butter". Other less commonly used ones are "Pumpkin Cherry Tart" (Gloyd/Jubileena), "Peanut Taffy" (Rancis/Taffyta), "Vanilla Taffy" (Taffyta/Vanellope), "Vanilla Pumpkin" (Vanellope/Gloyd)... you get the idea.
    • The Candlehead/Jubileena pairing is often called Cherry Bomb, named for the power-up in Sugar Rush that Candlehead activates by lighting the stems of cherries, which are Jubileena's theme.

Films — Live-Action

• Godzilla (2014) gives us 2MUTO for the antagonist monsters’ Battle Couple. A Portmanteau Couple Name was off the table due to the fact that MUTO is an acronym for the species (Massive Unknown Terrestrial Organism), and to tell different individuals apart, the fandom has given each a Fan Nickname consisting of “some prefix + -muto”, making a portmanteau awkward at best.
• In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a number of pairings have cropped up according to various Kink Memes.
  • The rarepair Bruce Banner/Bucky Barnes has the awesome shipname "Nuclear Winter."
  • The pairing of Tony Stark/Stephen Strange is also sometimes known as "The Sherlocks", due to both characters' actors having played Sherlock Holmes on separate occasions. Their typical ship name, Ironstrange, is an odd example since Strange actually is Stephen's last name, but Iron comes from Tony's hero name.
  • Angry Birds: Bruce Banner/Clint Barton
  • Stark Spangled Banner: Tony Stark/Steve Rogers/Bruce Banner
  • The Cold War: Steve Rogers/Natasha Romanoff
  • Science Boyfriends/Husbands: Bruce Banner/Tony Stark
  • Super Husbands: Steve Rogers/Tony Stark
  • American Pi: Steve Rogers/Bruce Banner
  • Birds of a Feather: Clint Barton/Sam Wilson
  • Strike Team Delta: Clint Barton/Natasha Romanoff, or Clint Barton/Phil Coulson/Natasha Romanoff
  • Black Hawk or Black Eye: Natasha Romanoff/Clint Barton
  • Starbucks: Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes (although this name is significantly more uncommon than the Portmanteau Couple Name "Stucky")
    • The specific variant of Stucky consisting of a pre-Serum Steve Rogers with a post-Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, or at least a Bucky with the general aesthetic of the Soldier, is called "Shrinkyclinks".
    • The shipping of a pre- or non-Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes with post-Serum Steve Rogers is called "Shrunkyclunks".
  • Black Falcon: T'Challa/Sam Wilson
  • Dr. Pepper: Bruce Banner/Pepper Potts
  • Dr. Pepperony: Bruce Banner/Pepper Potts/Tony Stark
  • Smash Bros: Hulk/Thor
  • Black Ice: Natasha Romanoff/Loki
  • Black Tie: Natasha Romanoff/Phil Coulson
  • Bow Tie: Clint Barton/Phil Coulson
  • World War 3some: Steve Rogers/Bucky Barnes/Peggy Carter
  • Barbershop Quartet: The combined foursome of the primary characters of Captain America: The Winter Soldier- Bucky Barnes, Steve Rogers, Natasha Romanoff, and Sam Wilson.
• From Saw (of all things), the pairing of Adam and Lawrence is called Chainshipping.
  • The fandom as a whole followed the leader on this, with basically all the ships in the series having names like this, such as Coffinshipping (Hoffman/Strahm), Pintshipping (Brit/Mallick), Spiralshipping (Zeke Banks/William Schenk), Shotgunshipping (Amanda/Lynn), and Piranhashipping (John Kramer/William Easton).
• Star Wars
  • The Force Awakens fandom prefers this kind of shipping names, as the one-syllable names most of the characters have don't work very well for Portmanteau Couple Names. It took absolutely no time at all to christen Finn/Poe Dameron (a Stormtrooper and a pilot, respectively) as "Stormpilot". For those who throw Rey into the mix, there's Jedistormpilot.
  • Rogue One brought us Rebelcaptain, the pairing of rebel Jyn Erso with Captain Cassian Andor, and Spiritassassin for Chirrut/Baze.
  • With the release of The Last Jedi, there's been an increase in support for Hux/Poe, now called Gingerpilot.
• Fight Club: Fans who ship the Narrator/Tyler love to call them "Soapshipping".

Literature

• Animorphs has "Closet Fan" for Visser 1/Visser 3.
• Good Omens has many, many idiosyncratic ship names, most of which are in regular use (though this depends where you go in the fandom).
  • Aziraphale/Crowley is "Air Conditioning" (inspired by how their initials are A/C) or "Ineffable Husbands." The "Ineffable Husbands" ship name also has the variants "Ineffable Wives" and "Ineffable Partners" for fans who like exploring the idea of them changing genders at will or not really having a defined gender to begin with.
  • This one is more from the Amazon series, but Gabriel/Beelzebub is "Ineffable Bureaucracy".
  • Hastur/Ligur is "Lurking Homos" or "Satanic Jehovah's Witnesses." Since the TV series, sometimes "Maggot Husbands".
  • Famine/Pollution is "Food Poisoning."
  • Aziraphale/Ligur is "Fire & Water."
  • Crowley/Hastur is "Central Heating."
  • Aziraphale/Famine is "Angel Food Cake."
  • Aziraphale/Lucifer is "The Devil Wears Tartan."
• Many of the main ships of the Harry Potter series are named with the HMS title, most notably the HMS Harmony (Harry/Hermione), which doubles as a Portmanteau and Idiosyncratic Ship name. For those of you unfamiliar with the British navy, each British ship has the letters "HMS" (for "Her (His) Majesty's Ship") before the actual ship name.
  • Harry/Hermione, or H/Hr, also goes by Pumpkin Pie and occasionally "Buckbeak" (after the hippogriff they rode together, once). "Harmonians" is still the accepted term for the shippers, though.
  • Remus/Sirius is often called WolfStar as a play on "Sirius," the dog star, and Remus, the wolf. Puppyshipping is also a common name for the pairing before Sirius was sent to Azkaban.
  • Albus Severus/Scorpius is generally known as The ASS Ship, or ASS shipping. Scorpius/Rose is sometimes known as Scorrow.
  • See the more comprehensive list of pairing names here. There's still the disturbing question of what to call Ron/Snape...
    • Snapon. As in, "snap-on", or "Snapron]". ([[KinkMeme Focus: apron kink).
    • Another, more extensive list of ship names.
  • Harry/Ginny is generally HMS Orange Crush (as Ginny is a redhead with a crush, or because one famous fic had her put a love potion into Harry's Fanta) or associated with Chocolate, after a scene where they shared chocolate in Order Of The Phoenix.
  • Ron/Hermione eschews the convention entirely when it goes by The Good Ship. As Ship Mates with Harry/Ginny, it's often called OBHWF (one big happy Weasley family).
  • The HMS convention is parodied by the name of the community The HMS STFU, which had the stated mission of mocking shipping Fan Dumb but in practice was an outlet for the Fan Haters of the infamously zealous Harmony shippers (Harmonians).
  • The Ginny/Tom Riddle ship is called the SS Gin-and-Tonic, or at least it used to be.
    • Neville/Luna — better known as "HMS The Government Stole My Toad."
  • Ginny/Luna is called SS Dreamy Redhead.
  • Fans of the Lupin/Tonks ship took a name from (supposedly) somebody jokingly saying that Sirius and Lupin couldn't get together because Lupin had to marry Tonks and have little color changing puppies. Thus, "Pink Puppies" was born.
  • One weird ship name in the Harry Potter universe is "Scottish Fire", which means Oliver/Ginny.
  • In addition to all of the above variations, an old (and apparently out-dated) form would be to simply squish the two characters being focused on's initials together. Ex: HPDM (Harry Potter, Draco Malfoy), HPRW (Harry Potter, Ron Weasley), etc.
• Heaven Official’s Blessing: Tian Guan Ci Fu: Shi Qingxuan/He Xuan has been dubbed "Beefleaf". It started as an emoji-related mistake. A fan picked a meat emoji to represent He Xuan and a leaf emoji to represent Shi Qingxuan. Other fans read it as "beef" and "leaf", and the name stuck.
• The Hunger Games:
  • All the likely combinations of Katniss/Peeta are unfortunate to some degree or another. Some fans reverted back to Idiosyncratic naming by combining "The Girl Who Was On Fire" with "The Boy with the Bread" and getting "Toast". As an additional bonus, it also connects to the District Twelve ritual of a bride and groom toasting a piece of bread as part of the wedding.
    • Although as a Portmanteau Couple Name work-around, fans got a non-Squicky name for Katniss/Peeta by combining their last names to make "Everlark".
  • Not a very widespread name, but "Arrows and Snares" has been used for Gale/Katniss.
    • Following suit of the surname-Portmanteau Couple Name with Katniss/Peeta, "Everthorne" has since been used for Katniss/Gale.
• The Moomins: While most popular ships use Portmanteau Couple Names, the fandom's One True Threesome of Moomintroll/Snorkmaiden/Snufkin (popular due to combining the Official Couple with the Fan-Preferred Couple) is known as the "Springtime Trio".
• In the The Silmarillion fandom, Maeglin/Celebrimbor is "Fallen Banners."
• A Song of Ice and Fire:
  • Based on a comment in the TV series that compared his personality with that of a lobster, the ship between Stannis and his Lady in Red Hot Witch (literally) Melisandre has been labeled "Red Lobster" or "Lobster Flambé"
  • "-cest" nicknames for incestuous pairings are also popular in the fandom, since the series has quite a bit of canonical incest, and even more Incest Yay Shipping. Most popular are "Lannincest" (typically, but not always, referring to the canonical Twincest between Cersei and Jaime) and "Starkcest" (typically referring to some combination of Robb Stark, Sansa Stark, Arya Stark and their bastard brother Jon Snow, but sometimes other Starks both dead and alive get involved). But just about any house name can be slotted in. Ironically, just about the only major family that doesn't get this is the Targaryens, since they do that so often "Targaryencest" wouldn't actually help you figure out what pairing is being referred to at all.
• In addition to using Portmanteau Couple Names, Warrior Cats has a lot of these. Here's a list.
• Worm:
  • Taylor/Lisa is alternately known as Skittles—a mutation of Skitter/Tattletale—and Smugbug—Lisa's smug, Skitter's a bug.
  • Taylor/Amy is known as pillbug—Taylor uses bugs, Amy is a medic.

Live-Action TV

• The 100 fans refer to the Clarke/Raven ship as "Princess Mechanic", because Raven is a mechanic, and Clarke is often called the slightly-mocking nickname "Princess". Though Princess Mechanic was the first, a lot of Raven ships are styled this way: Doctor Mechanic (Abby/Raven), Psychotic Mechanic (Murphy/Raven), and Bartender Mechanic (Gina/Raven).
• 24: The minuscule Ethan Kanin/Allison Taylor shipper fandom coined "Ethanberry," due to actress Cherry Jones' first name.
• Abbott Elementary: Most fans who ship Barbara and Melissa online have dubbed them "Work Wives".
• Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. mostly has portmanteau couple names (Skyeward for Skye/Agent Ward, Fitzsimmons for Agent Fitz/Agent Simmons, Fitzward for Agent Ward/Agent Fitz, and so on), but there is one exception which is Ward/Simmons, who are known as Biospecialist among fans due to their professions (biologist for Simmons, specialist for Ward). Skye/Simmons (Skimmons) later got the alternate ship name BioQuake.
• Ahsoka: Those who ship Sabine and Shin call them "WolfWren", a combination of Sabine's last name Wren and the fact that Shin was named after a wolf from Norse mythology.
• American Horror Story: Asylum: Most fans have taken to calling the ship of Lana/Sister Mary Eunice, "Bananun". A combination of Lana's nickname from Sister Jude, "Lana Banana", and the fact that Sister Mary Eunice is a nun.
• Battlestar Galactica (2003) has the catchphrase "Sine Qua Non" for Roslin and Adama, off the episode of the same name and the phrase's English translation, which Adama actually said aloud during the episode in question.
  Adama: Because I can't live without her.
• Buffy and Angel:
  • For the discerning fan, there's this (admittedly less popular) Aureliuscest. ^note Describes relationships between members of the Order of Aurelius — such as Darla and her sire The Master — who are all of the same vampiric bloodline and tend to fall into familial archetype roles. Also includes relationships between any of the Order and Connor.
  • Some also use Summerscest for Buffy/Dawn. At least it finally has a name. (Dares not speak it, though.)
• Castle has "Caskett" for the Castle/Beckett shippers, which is both a Portmanteau Couple Name and a play on the fact that they solve murders.
  • In the same fandom, fans of Ryan/Esposito occasionally refer to themselves as Roach shippers, after the portmanteau team name of Raley and Ochoa, their fictional counterparts in Castle's novels.
• Chilling Adventures of Sabrina has an odd example that mixes this with Portmanteau Couple Name. The very popular Zelda/Lilith ship is often referred to as "Madam Spellman". A mix of Zelda's last name Spellman and Lilith's self-proclaimed title of Madam Satan.
• Cobra Kai: Along with the "Lawrusso" nickname, Daniel/Johnny shippers like to call them "Karate Husbands" while Kreese/Terry Silver shippers go with "Cobra Husbands". For the younger cast, there is "Binary Boyfriends" or "Binary Brothers" for Demetri/Hawk.
• CSI-verse:
  • Grissom/Sara is known as GSR (Grissom-Sara Romance) or "geek love" (it helps that GSR is used frequently in-universe as an acronym for gunshot residue); and Lindsay/Danny as M&M (Monroe & Messer) or DL (Danny and Lindsay).
  • Yo!Bling (Catherine/Warrick) and CatNip (Catherine/Nick).
  • SMACked (Mac/Stella), and DnA (Danny/Aiden)
  • HipHuggers (Eric/Calleigh), and CaRWash (Calleigh/Ryan).
  • GCR is an alternate Grillows title (Grissom Catherine Romance.) Grissom/Lady Heather can be either GLH or CoolWhip.
  • The full list of ship names can be found at the main CSI forum, Talk CSI, in the Shipper Central area.
• In Degrassi: The Next Generation, the twincestual pairing of Fiona and Declan Coyne is referred to as Coynecest.
• Doctor Who.
  • The Doctor/Clara Oswald ship christened as "Whouffle" (Who/Soufflé). Fans are called "Whoufflepuffs". In a strange development, because the relationship between the Doctor and Clara continued after he regenerated, the ship name branched out two "sub-categories": When talking specifically about the Twelfth Doctor and Clara, it's known as "Whouffaldi" (in reference to Peter Capaldi, who plays Twelve), and the Eleventh Doctor Clara became known as "Souffez" (Souffle/Fez), though the overall Doctor/Clara pairing (referring to any incarnation of the Doctor and Clara) is still called "Whouffle" (which is also widely used when referring to Eleven/Clara as a holdover from the earlier era). It has a regular portmanteau pairing name as well, "Cloctor". Beginning in 2015 fans also began to use "Space Married" to refer to the Twelve/Clara pairing (derived from banter between them in the episode "Sleep No More" over how silly it is to append the word "space" to anything in outer space, i.e. "space restaurant", and the fact the two characters acted like a married couple throughout Series 9; this of course, contributed to ongoing Ship-to-Ship Combat with fans of River Song, who is canonically the Doctor's actual wife).
  • Doctor/Master is called "Best Enemies", after the Master called the Doctor his "best enemy" once. On Livejournal and Tumblr, "Timecock" was also popular as their ship name... but then the Master regenerated into a woman, and it never recovered. One name for Thirteen/Dhawan Master specifically is SpyDoc, due to the Master disguising himself as a spy in his first appearance.
  • The pairing of the Doctor and River Song (specifically River and the Eleventh Doctor) is often referred to as "Yowzah". It derives from an exclamation Eleven was known to use on occasion, usually in reference to the Mrs. Robinson-esque River. When the show later paired River with Twelve, some fans attempted to apply Yowzah to that pairing, but it didn't take due to the different personality of the new Doctor. "Hello Sweetie" applies to both, though.
• Firefly has mostly Portmanteau Couple Name. The exception to this rule is Simon/River, which has two Idiosyncratic Ship Names. First, the classic surname + cest tradition gets them dubbed as "Tamcest." But they are also known among the fandom—probably more commonly than Tamcest—as CSI, or "Crazy Space Incest."
• Gilmore Girls had a few including:
  • JavaJunkie — Luke and Lorelai. Taken literally from the first scene of the series at Luke's counter where Lorelai is enjoying coffee and he calls her a junkie for the stuff.
  • Narcoleptics — Rory and Dean — taken from Lorelai calling Dean Narcolepsy Boy
  • Literati — Rory and Jess — from the two's mutual love for books
  • Nudist — Rory and Marty — taken by how they met, where Rory found Marty passed out and naked in the hallway after their first Yale party
  • Balcony Buddies — Lorelai and Christopher — name refers to balcony of Lorelai's childhood bedroom where Rory was conceived
  • Sophies — Rory and Logan — name taken from a Master and Commander reference made between the two. Later viewers of reruns have taken the PCN name Rogan though (older fans loathe it because it reminds them of Joe Rogan and the LA sportscaster Fred Roggin)
  • PDLD — Rory and Finn — this is mostly a Crack Pairing named from the acronym Punch Drunk Love Duo.
• Almost every Glee couple is referred to—both in-universe and as out—by a rather twee Portmanteau Couple Name such as "Finchel", "Samcedes", or "Klaine", but there are Idiosyncratic Ship Names to be found.
  • Tina Cohen-Chang and Mike Chang (called by the portmanteau "Tike" by fans) are in-universe known as "Chitty-Chitty-Chang-Chang."
  • Darren Criss has stated in an interview that his all time favorite nickname for Klaine (or the Klaiken) was Kurt Koblaine.
  • Kurt and Karofsky are often just referred to as "Kurtofsky", but there's a good amount of people who also refer to it as "Pirateshipping" due to an old tumblr post comparing various pairings to boats. The only other result of this trope gaining any traction was Kurt/Mike being called "Enterprise", since their portmanteau couple name was...Kurke.
• Gotham: Bruce Wayne and Selina Kyle are referred to by fans as "Baby Bat-Cat," in reference to their future identities.
• Hannibal:
  • Will Graham^note who regularly adopts stray dogs/Beverly Katz is known as ‘Katz and Dogs’.
  • Will/Hannibal is known on Tumblr as Hannigram◊.
  • Frederick Chilton/Freddie Lounds is known as Fred^2 ("Fred Squared").
• Heroes has "Petrellicest" for Peter/Nathan and S&M for Sylar/Mohinder.
• While most ships from High School Musical: The Musical: The Series use Portmanteau Couple Names, the pairing of Gina and E.J. is just as often referred to as "Portwell" as it is "Team Wonderstudies", the latter based on the nickname they gain from being understudies to the leads in the first season.
• Horatio Hornblower fans refer to Horatio and Archie as Indy Husbands due to the fact they spent most of their time on the Indefatigable (also known as the Indy). Similarly, the ship name for Horatio and Bush is Hotspur Husbands, as they served together on the Hotspur.
• House has a Portmanteau Couple Name with a twist in the form of "14" for the Eric Foreman/Remy "Thirteen" Hadley ship.
• How I Met Your Mother
  • Barney/Robin fans in call this pairing BrOTP — referring to the two being "bros", being their One True Pairing and "BR" being their initials. Additionally, some Barney/Robin fans prefer the name "Swarkles," referring to Robin's history as Robin Sparkles, Canadian pop-star, and Swarley, a nickname for Barney after a name mess-up at Starbucks
  • There's also LAME for Marshall/Lily — "LA" standing for Lily Aldrin and "ME" standing for Marshall Eriksen. Please note that this does not reflect on fans' opinions of the ship: Lily and Marshall are Happily Married and much beloved by the fandom.
• iCarly: Fatcakes YEAH!! for Principal Franklin/Sam based off a combination between his computer password and her love for fatcakes.
• Kamen Rider Double has a semi-official one. For fans of shipping Shoutaro and Phillip you might as well call the pairing Doublecest. However, on TVN fans of Phillip/Wakana, after learning that the two are related, call the pairing Wincest. Several even lamented the fact that it's Wincest but said they didn't really care.
  • Kamen Rider Kiva has Kivacest for Wataru and Taiga, who turns out to be his brother, among other things. Of course, it'd still be technically accurate if it was the pairing of Wataru and Otoya (who get to meet a few times via Time Travel) but no one uses the term that way. Of course, Parental Incest is more squicky.
• Leverage has Pretzels for Parker/Hardison after Parker used pretzels in one episode to try to explain her feelings to Hardison. Used more or less interchangeably with Pardison.
• The pairing of Charlie Pace and Claire Littleton on Lost was known as PB&J. The nickname is grounded in both Idiosyncratic Ship Naming and is a type of Portmanteau Couple Name. Idiosyncratically it's referential to the first season episode "Confidence Men" when Charlie convinces Claire to share some "imaginary peanut butter" with him to satisfy her pregnancy-driven peanut butter craving. As a portmanteau, however, the initials "PB&J" stand for "Pregnant Babe" and "Junkie," respectively, referring of course to Claire's pregnancy and Charlie's heroin addiction.
• Lost Girl has "Doccubus" for the Bo/Lauren pairing, so called because Lauren is a doctor and Bo is a succubus.
• M*A*S*H has Blueberry Pancakes, the ship of Major Charles Winchester and Red Cross nurse Donna Marie Parker. There's also The More The Merrier, which refers to Hawkeye Pierce/BJ Hunnicutt/his wife Peg Hunnicutt.
• Arthur/Morgana shippers from the Merlin fandom get brownie points for their ship name is both a Portmanteau Couple Name and Idiosyncratic Ship Naming at the same time. The name, ArMor, comes from joining the two characters' names (Arthur and Morgana), but it's also a throwback to a particular scene in episode 2 of series 1, which deals with actual armor, and is arguably the biggest Arthur/Morgana scene in the show.
• NCIS: The motto of Gibbs/Jen shippers everywhere is "Because Paris never ended..." It should be noted that there is a reason for this one — it's the last place where they were together as lovers. Paris is actually used at least once by them to refer to their past.
• Once Upon a Time has loads. Just take any character, and pair them with another character, you're guaranteed to come up with a clever ship name.
  • Emma/Regina is Swan Queen, taken from Emma's last name and the fact that Regina is the Evil Queen.
  • Most pairings with Emma go this way. Mad Swan is Emma/Jefferson(the Mad Hatter), Wooden Swan is Emma/August(Pinocchio), HuntSwan is for Emma/Graham, Golden Swan for Emma/Mr Gold(Rumpelstiltskin), Red Swan for Emma/Ruby(Little Red Riding Hood), Captain Swan for Emma/Hook...you get the idea.
  • Regina similarly. Mad Queen for Regina/Jefferson, Evil Charming or Charming Queen for Regina/David(Prince Charming), Gold Queen for Regina/Mr Gold, Stable Queen is Regina and her true love, Daniel, who was a stable-boy, Outlaw Queen for Regina and Robin Hood, destined to be her second true love, Snow Queen is Regina/Mary Margaret(Snow White), and Red Queen is Regina/Ruby. Regal Believer is for the mother/son relationship between Henry ("True Believer") and Regina.
  • Red Snow is for Ruby/Mary Margaret, but it might not count as in the fairytale world it's a portmanteau name.
  • There is also Red Beauty for Ruby/Belle, based on Ruby being Red Riding Hood and Belle being the titular Beauty from Beauty and the Beast.
• Orphan Black has Science Girlfriends for Cosima/Delphine, which eventually becomes canon. There's also Soccer Cop for Alison/Beth, ProPunk for Rachel/Sarah, Lumberpunk for Cal/Sarah, Proscience for Rachel/Cosima, Militarypunk for Paul/Sarah, among others.
• Our Flag Means Death has a few:
  • Edward/Stede is sometimes known as Gentlebeard.
  • Oluwande/Jim is called Teal Oranges, for Jim's favorite color being the teal, the color of Olu's earrings, and the oranges growing on Jim's family land when Olu visited with them.
  • Lucius/Black Pete is called Wooden Babes, because they call each other "babe" in-universe and Pete gave Lucius a gift of a wooden finger after Lucius's finger became infected and had to be cut off.
• The television show Roswell had shipper names up the ying-yang, a mix of idiosyncratic and portmanteau alike, but the two most prominent ones were the Dreamers and the Candies.
  • "Dreamers" was the shipper name for the lead characters, Max and Liz. This is largely an instance of Idiosyncratic Ship Naming, inspired by the fans' shared dream of Max and Liz becoming a couple and living happily ever after in the name of true love. It was also in part a reference to a moment during the first season episode "Blind Date" when Max referred to Liz as his "dream girl."
  • "Candies," on the other hand, was a portmanteau of the initials of the show's secondary couple, Michael and Maria. Unlike the idiosyncratic origin of "Dreamers," the "Candy Couple" were so-called because their combined initials are "M&M," like the candy.
  • "Stargazers" was the shipper name for Alex/Isabel, due to an episode where, you guessed it, Alex and Isabel went stargazing.
• Almost as soon as Sanctuary fans got their hands on this promo, the small-but-devoted Helen/Will contingent coined "British Charm" as their Idiosyncratic Ship Name.
• Sherlock fandom mostly uses portmanteaus, but romantic/sexual shipping of Mycroft and Sherlock Holmes is often referred to as Holmescest (in addition to the portmanteau Mylock), while gen fic and art is often marked as "Holmes bros" or "Holmes brothers."
• Star Trek:
  • Some Janeway/Chakotay shippers from Star Trek: Voyager referred to it as "Jetski", a pun based on the French "J et C".
  • The original name for the Kirk andSpock pairing — "Kirk Slash Spock" (Kirk/Spock) — came to be shortened to simply "slash." Yes, this was the genesis of the term "Slash Fic", making "slash" the Ur-Example. They are also known as "Space Husbands" in some circles (due to occasionally acting like a married couple), as well as just "K/S".
  • As a play off the above and their respective series name, the Garak/Bashir ship is called "Deep Space Husbands".
  • There's also an odd example with "Space Wives", wherein the name exists but doesn't seem to belong to any particular ship. It seems to be shared between Uhura/Chapel, Uhura/T'Pring, and Kirk/Spock, but there may well be others.
• Stargate Atlantis has "Sparky" for John/Elizabeth. Also "Spanky" for Ronon/Teyla, especially when it's in conjunction with Sparky.
• Supernatural
  • Sam/Dean Winchester is more popularly known as Wincest. When John is involved, it becomes Daddycest. If the Winchesters are underage at the time it becomes Wee-cest (not to be confused with genfic featuring young Winchesters — Wee-chesters).
  • The foursome of Sam/Dean/Castiel/Gabriel which is called Team Free Love.
  • Gabriel/Anna is known as Strawberry Cheesecake - she has red hair, he likes sweet things. Equivalent Sam/Gabriel ship names would be Fruit Salad or - hilariously - Chocolate Moose.
  • Jared/Jensen, the pairing of Sam and Dean's real-life actors became popular enough to get its own nickname of "J2" or "J-Squared".
• Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles 'Jameron' was the fan made name for the relationship between John Connor and Cameron Phillips.
• Torchwood: Anything having to do with stopwatches or naked hide-and-go seek is likely about Jack/Ianto.
• Korean reality show We Got Married features couples known as the Sweet Potato Couple (Yonghwa and Seohyun, also YongSeo), the Adam Couple (Jo Kwon and Ga In), the Dimple Couple (Kang Sora and Leeteuk, also TeukSo), and more.
• Fans of Mulder/Scully on The X-Files tended to just call themselves "Shippers" (in fact, this was the fandom that coined the term "shipper"). A lot of other pairing names then evolved out of "Shipper" including "Dipper" (Doggett/Scully), "Skipper" (Krycek/Scully), "Dripper" (Doggett/Reyes), "Skamper" (Krycek/Marita), etc. Since they are somewhat derived from the characters' names, but still not immediately obvious to people unfamiliar with fandom, this probably qualifies as the half-way point between Idiosyncratic Ship Naming and Portmanteau Couple Name.
• Run amok on soap operas. Examples include: "S&C" for Sonny/Carly, "S&B" for Sonny/Brenda, "L&L" for Luke/Laura, "L&L2" for Lucky/Liz, etc.

Music

• My Chemical Romance has Waycest, AKA Gerard and Mikey Way.
• Although generally pairing names are just portmanteaus (e.g. KaiMei for Kaito/Meiko, LukaGaku for Luka/Gakupo, etc), Slash Fic pairings in Vocaloid are more likely to get odd.
  • Some refer to Kaito/Len as 'Banana Split', due to their respective character items of ice cream and bananas (although it does make one wonder if the former is a hebephile, Len being 14 with Kaito at an estimated 21, and is somewhat parodied in the aptly named Shotarella). In addition Kaito/Gakupo is referred to as "naisu", a clever merging of "nasu" (eggplant) and "aisu" (ice cream), and Kaito/Gakupo/Len as OT3 often has "bananaisu".
  • The pairing of Miku/Luka is dubbed "negitoro", referring to a Japanese food made with their respective food items of "negi" (leek) and "toro" (fatty tuna).
  • Japanese fans often refer to Len/Luka as "Banagro" (written "Banaguro"), banana + maguro (tuna).
  • The only het pairing with a common idiosyncratic name would be Rin/Len in "Kagaminecest", occasionally referred to as Mirrorcest.

Pro Wrestling

• "Hardycest". Nuff said.
• The original ISN in wrestling fandom was "Smoochy Dreamers", for the fans of Chris Jericho/Stephanie McMahon. The name was taken from an infamous promo in which they proclaimed they were NOT having "smoochy dreams" about each other.

Theater

• Be More Chill has loads due to the large cast of eight characters. The most notable ones are "Boyf Riends" for Jeremy/Michael and "Stagedorks" for Jeremy/Christine.
• Dear Evan Hansen has three major ones: Evan/Connor is referred to as "Treebros", Evan/Connor/Jared is called "Sincerely Three", and Zoe/Alana is called "Galaxy Gals".
• In the Hamilton fandom, the shipping of Lafayette/John Laurens/Alexander Hamilton is often referred to as "The Gay Trio". This naming has a historical basis, but it now mostly used to refer to the ship.
• The shipping of Grantaire and Enjolras (also known as Enjoltaire) in the Les Misérables fandom is often simply called "E/R". Grantaire signs his name as a capital "R", a play on words ("Grantaire" = "grand R" = "big/capital R").
• Wicked: Though most commonly know by the portmanteau Gelphie, Galinda/Elphaba has also been known as "Pink Goes Good With Green."

Toys

• In the Ever After High fandom, Raven/Apple is know as both "Rapple" and "Poison Apple". The latter comes from Raven being the destined future Evil Queen who will give the next Snow White, Apple, a poisoned apple.

Video Games

• Baldur's Gate III:
  • Bloodweave = Astarion/Gale
  • Heartburn = Shadowheart/Karlach
  • Heartforge = Karlach/Dammon
  • Moonangel = Isobel/Dame Aylin
  • Bloodpact = Astarion/Wyll
  • Hellspawn = Astarion/Karlach
• BanG Dream! Girls Band Party! has '342g' for Sayo/Tsugumi, as the first three syllables in their pairing name sound like numbers: san (three), yon (four), tsu (two, in English), and then just a 'g' for the extra 'gu' (as ship names in Japanese are mostly composed of only the first two syllables in characters' names).
• Cuphead:
  • Snake Eyes = The Devil/King Dice
  • Ghost Blossom = Cagney Carnation/Blind Specter
  • Melon Candy = Grim Matchstick/Baroness Von Bon Bon
  • Starry Flower = Hilda Berg/Cagney Carnation
  • Magical Carnival = Djimmi The Great/Beppi The Clown
  • Smokey Roulette = Mr. Wheezy/Pirouletta
  • Eye Candy = Blind Specter/Baroness Von Bon Bon
  • Cupcest = Cuphead/Mugman
• Dance Central: Any ship between dance partners is referred to by their crew name. For example, "Lu$h" for Angel/Aubrey and "Riptide" for Emilia/Bodie. The only variant being "Glittercest" for Jaryn/Kerith because, well ... they're twins.
• Fans of the female elf Inquisitor/Solas pairing in Dragon Age: Inquisition have a very spoilerific little name for their ship/fandom: the Wolf Pack.
• Final Fantasy:
  • Final Fantasy XIII: The Fang/Vanille/Lightning One True Threesome is "Neapolitan." The brunette Fang — chocolate, pink-haired Lightning = strawberry, and Vanille... well, duh.
  • Dissidia Final Fantasy has given rise to Voidshipping (Exdeath/Cloud of Darkness). If you've ever heard them speak, the reasons behind this should be very, very clear.
    • Since Duodecim, Roseshipping (Firion/Lightning) has gained quite a bit of popularity as well. There's more than just Something about a Rose here.
    • There's also 589, which refers to the original games of Bartz, Squall and Zidane respectively. It's more frequently used in fanworks about their awesome Dissidia-canon friendship, but using it to describe a One True Threesome situation is not unheard of.
• The Golden Sun fandom is known for fierce protectiveness of one's own favorite ships, all of which are named according to characteristics of the shipped characters (or fanfiction in-jokes) rather than their names. Notable examples include Valeshipping (Isaac/Jenna), Mudshipping (Isaac/Mia), Spikeydomeshipping (Garet / Sheba), Laundryshipping (Garet/Dora), Flameshipping (Garet/Jenna), Hotplasmashipping or Burnshipping (Ivan/Jenna), Windshipping (Ivan/Sheba), Lighthouseshipping (Felix/Sheba), Oopsiesshipping (Felix/Jenna), Duskshipping (Felix/Karst), Aquashipping (Piers/Mia), Blazeshipping (Alex/Jenna), and Spiritshipping (Matthew/Sveta). See here for a partial list, as well as a good guide as to how to name a new pairing.
• Hades: The Theseus/Asterius ship is called "Burgerking", since Theseus was King of Athens in life and Asterius is the Minotaur.
• The Legend of Zelda series has a small yet growing group of Linkcest shippers, people who ship all variants of Link together. This especially made popular with the Four Swords manga, where Red/Blue was hinted. Other common ships is Time/Twilight, Time/Sky, Twilight/Sky, or simply Time/Twilight/Sky. It even has a group on deviantART.
• Mass Effect:
  • "Talibrations" is the name given to the relationship between Tali/Garrus, who hook up near the end of 3 if neither were previously romanced by Shepard. The name is a reference to Garrus' infamous "Can it wait? I'm in the middle of some calibrations" line in Mass Effect 2, which turned into a Running Gag in Mass Effect 3.
  • Although the majority of fans refer to the Shepard/Liara relationship as "Shiara," a minority prefers "Little Blue Children" instead.
• Namu Amida Butsu! -UTENA-: One name for the Yakushi/Ashuku ship is "Suama", a celebratory Japanese confection colored in white and pink, referring to the characters' respective color schemes.
• OMORI:
  • Sunny/Aubrey is known as "Sunburn".
  • Sunny/Basil (an Innocent Flower Boy) is known as "Sunflower", sometimes with an extra n.
  • Sunny/Aubrey/Basil is "Burnt Sunflower".
  • Sunny/Kel is known as "Suntan".
  • Aubrey/Kel is sometimes known as "Baseball".
  • Aubrey/Kim is "Jawbreaker".
  • Basil/Kel is "Cactiflower".
  • Basil/Kim is "Honeysuckle".
  • Hero/Mari is usually referred to as Heromari, but is sometimes called "Picnic Sandwich" (since Mari is associated with picnics and Hero got nis nickname from hero sandwiches), or (jokingly) "Mario".
  • Omori/Stranger is "Nightshade".
  • Sometimes, ship names are created based off of the flowers Basil compares the others to in the dreamworld (aka Roselily for Heromari because Basil compares Hero to a rose in the dreamworld and Mari to a lily of the valley).
• Overwatch:
  • The canon Tracer/Emily pairing is also known as "Lemon Tea."
  • Zarya/Mei is sometimes known as "Ice Bears."
  • Mei/Junkrat is known as "Meihem", "IcyHot", and "Nuclear Winter".
  • Lúcio/Junkrat is sometimes called "Boombox."
  • Soldier: 76/Reaper is sometimes called "Overdads."
  • Pharah/Mercy is called "Rocket Angel" or the portmanteau "Pharmercy," which doubles as a pun on Mercy's medical profession.
  • D.Va/Lúcio, who have rabbit and frog symbols respectively, has been called "Bunnyribbit."
  • Mercy/Genji is sometimes known as "Emergenji." A variant of this is "Emergency," overlapping with Portmanteau Couple Name while making the pun more apparent and, as with the above Pharmercy, playing on Mercy's background as a surgeon/status in-game as The Medic (as well as Genji's Emergency Transformation in all likelihood).
  • Widowmaker/Sombra is known as "Spider Byte."
  • Likewise, Ashe/Sombra is sometimes known as "Viper Byte."
  • Mercy/Roadhog is known as "Hambulance."
  • Mercy/Reaper is known as "Mercykill."
  • Likewise, Sombra/Reaper is known as "Hackerkill."
  • Mercy/Mei is known as "Snow Angel."
  • Pharah/Symmetra often goes by "Symmarah" or "Pharametra", but can also be referred to as "Light Artillery."
  • D.Va/Brigitte is known as "Mekamechanic."
  • Pharah/Sombra is known as "Jet Hack."
  • Mercy/Tracer is known as "Speedy Recovery."
  • Symmetra/Junkrat is known as "Ordered Chaos."
  • Widowmaker/Ashe is known as "OuiHaw."
  • Cassidy/Sombra/Ashe is sometimes referred to as "Los Deadlock" - a call back to the gangs the trio were(or in Ashe's case, are) a part of.
• In Oxenfree there's Jonas/Ren, known as "Weed Beanies," due to Ren getting high on pot brownies over the course of the game and Jonas, well, wearing a beanie.
• Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door: The Vivian/Koops ship is called ShadowShell, based on their respective species, with Vivian being a Living Shadow and Koops being a Koopa (a turtle-like creature).
• As previously mentioned in the Anime & Manga section, Pokémon has an absurd number of these-pretty much every couple, canon or not, game, anime, this manga, that manga, or a combination of all of the above, has one.
  • Here's a list of the ever-expanding list of ships in the Pokemon franchise.
• Puyo Puyo: Western fans take to calling Ringo x Tee "Apple Tea", due to the punny nature of the name^note not only does Ringo carry an apple everywhere she goes, but her name means "apple" in Japanese and how easy it rolls off the tongue.
• Splatoon: Since the different playable characters go by numbered code names, ships between the series' first three protagonists have names based multiplying these numbers together (acting as a play on the common shipping markup of Character A x Character B):
  • Agents 3/8 is known as Agent 24.
  • Agents 4/8 is known as Agent 32.
  • Agents 3/4 is known as Agent 12.
  • Agents 3/4/8 is known as Agent 96.
• Tales from the Borderlands has Rhys/Vaughn, both Hyperion employees, usually referred to as "Gayperion."
• Tales Series:
  • Even though the Tales of Symphonia fandom tends to much more often use Portmanteau Couple Names, (very) rarely there are times when "____Shipping" has been used. There is "Airshipping", now known as "Sylvashipping", or more commonly, Colloyd. Other non-Portmanteau Couple Names for pairings are "Sagecest" (Genis x Raine), and "Chosenshipping" (Zelos x Colette). Of note, while it would fall under Portmanteau Couple Name, Kratos x Raine is sometimes referred to as "The UKraine."
  • The most obvious example to come out of Tales of the Abyss is also the most spoilertastic: Luke/Asch is usually called Replicacest. The term is also less frequently applied to Ion and Sync.
• Team Fortress 2, when it doesn't portmanteau, uses some strange names: "Helmet Party" (Soldier/Engineer) and "Wincest" (RED Spy/BLU Scout).
  • "Wincest" is a Memetic Mutation presumably originating on 4chan, unsurprisingly adopted by the TF2 community. Usually delivered in the form of "Incest? More like WINCEST, amiright?"
    • Additionally, it's only "Wincest" if RED Spy is BLU Scout's father. You can have a non-incest RED Spy/BLU Scout pairing, because RED Spy fathering BLU Scout has neither been confirmed or denied by Valve.
  • There's also "Classcest", which is one class paired with another of the same class. Ex. RED Spy x BLU Spy, or BLU Sniper x BLU Female!Sniper.
  • Scout/Pyro is occasionally known as "Flashfire." Because Scout's fast and Pyro...yeah.
    • Similarly, Sniper/Scout has the name "Speeding Bullet".
  • "Texas Toast" for Engineer/Pyro, playing on the Engineer hailing from that state and the food.
  • The popular Heavy/Medic pairing is sometimes referred to as "Red Oktoberfest", which alludes to the nationalities of both via invoking the Russian October Revolution and the German beer festival.
  • Since both specialize in scientific disciplines, Medic/Engineer is called "Science Party".
  • Soldier/Demoman is known as "Boots and Bombs" (or "Boots N Bombs").
  • Sniper/Medic has been referred to as "Bush Medicine", alluding to Sniper's experiences in the Australian wilderness.
  • Demoman/Medic is known by the punny name "Jagerbombs".
  • Sniper/Spy is sometimes called "Bloody Suit", after Spy's voice line "You got blood on my suit."
• Tomb Raider (2013): Lara and Sam's ship is dubbed S.S. Endurance (Same-Sex Endurance). The name of the ship is a play on their research vessel Endurance that shipwrecked on Yamatai island.
• The Touhou Project fandom came up with a number of appropriate titles or description for different pairings. An interesting subversion is made on this case; rather than just using the title itself, the fans actually tag it behind the respective Portmanteau Couple Names to form a phrase. For example, "MariAli is my justice" for Marisa/Alice, "YukaRei is my way" for Yukari/Reimu, "MokoKene is the reign of god" for Mokou/Keine, and so on. These are popular among Japanese Touhou fans and are recognized as creative ways to say a certain pairing is their OTP.
  • And here's this video.
  • Mokou/Keine is also coined as "Mocha Cake" by some fans because "Mokou Keine" sounds a lot like it.
• Undertale:
  • Papyrus/Undyne is sometimes known as "Fishbones."
  • Asgore/Gaster is known as "Kingdings."
  • Sans/Papyrus is known as "Fontcest."
  • Rarepair Toriel/Gaster is known as "Toaster."
  • Nice-Cream Guy/Burgerpants = "Nicepants."
  • Sans/Grillby, though usually referred to as Sansby, is also known as "Bonefire."
  • Rarepair Sans/Muffet is known as "Dunkin Donuts".
• For Chris/Josh from Until Dawn, there's "Climbing Class."
  • There's also "Chrash" for Chris/Ashley.

Visual Novels

• The Ace Attorney series has a few like this — Gavincest, Feycest, Marshallcest.
• While the Danganronpa fandom usually uses Portmanteau Couple Names, some ships have these.
  • "Bubblegum Rock" for Kazuichi Soda/Leon Kuwata (Kazuichi has pink hair, and Leon wants to be a rock star)
  • "Soapies" for Hiyoko Saionji/Mahiru Koizumi (taken from a line from the Orenronen fan translation)
  • "Despaircest" for Mukuro Ikusaba/Junko Enoshima, the "Despair Sisters"
  • "Heir Guitar" or "K-Ton" for Ibuki Mioda/Fat Byakuya Togami (Ibuki is a guitarist and a walking homage to K-On!, and Twogami is fat and the Togami Corporation heir. Though he's actually a fake Togami.
  • Hajime Hinata/Kazuichi Soda is "Soul Friends", because the latter calls the former that in the prologue when befriending him.
  • Ibuki Mioda/Mikan Tsumiki is known as Band Aid, because (as stated above) Ibuki is a musician and Mikan is a nurse.
  • Though Sayaka Maizono/Mukuro Ikusaba is better known by it’s portmanteau name Ikuzono, you’ll sometimes see it called Shooting Star or Killing Harmony (the second in reference to the English subtitle of the third game) because Mukuro is a soldier and Sayaka is a singer.
  • In Danganronpa V3: Killing Harmony, Catbug for Ryoma Hoshi/Gonta Gokuhara, since Gonta is the Ultimate Entomologist and Ryoma is a Kindhearted Cat Lover.
  • V3 also has Nursery Rhymes for Kaede Akamatsu/Maki Harukawa (though Kaemaki and Harumatsu are also used), because Kaede is a pianist and Maki is a child caregiver. As in Heir Guitar's case, this relies on a fake talent; Maki's actually the Ultimate Assassin, which is also why is known as Killing Harmony which is also a pun on the game they come from.

Web Animation

• Helluva Boss:
  • Moxxie and Millie are called "M&M", due to their shared first initial as well as it rolling off the tongue better than trying to combine their names.
  • "Criminale" for Crimson/Alessio, both due to it sounding like criminal as it also sounding like "Crim and Al" when spoken aloud.
• Murder Drones has the ship name for N and V be "Envy", due to the two letters combined sounding like the word. V's jealously over N and Uzi's growing friendship also makes it rather fitting.
  • When portmanteaus of their names aren't in use, there are other ship names too. The fandom has given rise to things like "Biscuit Bites" (N and Uzi), "Pink Lemonade" (V and Lizzy), "Biscuit Jocks" (N and Thad), "Oil Rose" (V and J), "Killing Blonde" (V and Thad), and more.
• Mystery Skulls Animated: The ship name for all three of the human (formerly human, in Lewis' case) members of the Mystery Skulls is referred to as "Poly Skulls", though the Portmanteau Couple Name "Lewvithur" is just as if not more common.
• RWBY: Colour as a form of personal, artistic expression is so important in the story, wars have been fought, and the four main characters were introduced in prequel advertising trailers by their colour themes. As a result, shipping names always take an individual's colour theme and combines them. For example, "Rainbow" is used for everyone/everyone ships and a fan-made chart exists to capture all the shipping names. The show's creators have acknowledged the fandom shipping names by using them as attack strategy call-signs in the show itself. To use just the main characters of Team RWBY as an example of how this works:
  • Ruby's dominant colour is red, and her surname and personal motif is a rose. Weiss's theme is white, with her surname meaning "snow" and her dominant powers being ice-based. Their most common ship name is "White Rose".
  • Blake's dominant colour is black and her surname is Belladonna, after the flower. Yang's dominant colour is yellow, and she is associated with the sun and fire. Their names form the "B" and "Y" of "RWBY", they are the "BY" ship (pronounced "bee"). Combined with the black-and-yellow theme, their most common ship name is "Bumblebee".
  • This leads to variations, using the most common names as follows: Ruby/Blake is "Ladybug" (red and black), Weiss and Blake is "Monochrome" or "Checkmate" (black and white), and Weiss and Yang is "Freezerburn" (white and ice with yellow and fire). When shipping the four girls together, the most common ship name is "Pollination" (White Rose meets Bumblebee).
  • On the flip side, when pairings aren't quite as serious, their names are usually a source of jokes, which leads us to the ship of Yang and Mercury: An Arm And A Leg.
• Spooky Month: When not just using the "[a] x [b]" format:
  • Shipping all three members of the Hatzgang together is usually referred to as Polyhatz.
  • John x Jack is Smokydonuts.
  • Kevin x Streber is Candybats.
  • John x Ross's Dad is Smokeymotors.
  • Bob Velseb x Dexter Erotoph is Rat Meat.
  • Skid x Pump is Spooky Shipping.
  • Happy Fella x Sad Guy is Sleepy Sun.
  • Kevin x Radford is Caramel Popcorn.
  • Skid's Dad x Ignacio is Holyfire.
  • Kevin x Rick is Jaded Employees.
• The Amazing Digital Circus: In just a few days of the pilot existing, the fandom created:
  • Jax x Pomni is FunnyBunny
  • Gangle x Kinger is RoyalRibbon
  • Jax x Gangle is Ribbun
  • Ragatha x Pomni is ButtonBlossom or Jesterdoll
  • Ragatha x Jax is Bunnydoll
  • Kinger x Queenie is RoyallyChess
  • Caine x the Moon is BlueTooth
  • Zooble x Gangle is Abstragedy
  • Caine x Pomni is Showtime
  • Caine x Kinger is Kingleader or RoyalTeeth

Webcomics

• In Ava's Demon fandom, Ava/Odin is known as Flaming Arrow, and Ava/Maggie as Forest Fire.
• Hedone High fans affectionatly dubbed A.E.D and Izm "A.A.I.R". (A.E.D And Izm Romance.) Their catchphrase is "How can you breathe/live without your A.A.I.R?"
• Homestuck:
  • The comic's incredibly convoluted approach to romance requires fans to use this in spades. It uses ♥ (<3) to represent a matespritship, a ship where the two love each other (e.g. "Rose♥Kanaya"); a ♠ (<3<) to represent a kismesissitude, when they want to bonk each other out of hate (e.g. "John♠Karkat"); a ♦ (<>) for a moirallegiance, a kind of platonic bond where two people keep each other in line (e.g. "Nepeta♦Equius"); and a ♣ (c3<) for an auspisticism, an unstable relationship being mediated by the person written in the middle (e.g. "Past Karkat♣Jade♣Current Karkat"). Since the trolls are all represented by astrological symbols, people sometimes use those as a kind of classy shorthand for troll ships — so ♑♥♉ would mean Gamzee♥Tavros, and ♋♥♊ would mean Karkat♥Sollux.
  • The Homestuck fandom also has an insane number of more... creative ship names, ranging from widely-used to off-hand jokes and the serious to the completely ridiculous. If you can think of a pairing, no matter how cracky, it probably has a pairing name. There's even a whole tumblr dedicated to coming up with new, funny pairing names. Homestuck Resources has a good list of some of them here. Below are some of the most common:
    • "Peanut Butter and Jelly" for Gamzee/Tavros, based on their blood colors.
    • "Strawberry Jam" for Dave/Gamzee, after Gamzee referred to Dave's blood as this.
    • "Communism" for John/Karkat (based on their weapon of choice — a hammer and a sickle, respectively).
    • "Stridercest" for Bro/Dave, Dirk/Dave or Dirk/Bro.
    • "Dersecest" for Dave/Rose and "Prospitcest" for John/Jade (based on their shared dream planets); Dave/Rose is also known as Knightlight, based on their class and aspect respectively.
    • "Grimdorks" for Rose/John (John is a dork, and Rose once went grimdark).
    • "Con Heir" and "Spider8reath" for John/Vriska.
    • "Rosemary" for Rose/Kanaya (a portmanteau using part of Kanaya's surname).
    • "Spaceshipping" for Kanaya/Jade and "Timeshipping" for Aradia/Dave (based on their shared Sburb aspects).
    • "Spacetime" for Jade/Dave.
    • "Hammertime" for John/Dave. Also "Pepsicola" for their associated colors.
    • "Guns n' Roses" for Rose/Jade, since Jade likes guns and Rose... yeah.
    • "Meowrails" for Nepeta♦Equius (members of a ♦ relationship are known as moirails).
    • "Scourgecest" for Terezi/Vriska, who are not related but were known as Team Scourge/the Scourge Sisters when they played Flarp together.
    • "Cotton Candy" for Jane/Roxy (based on their chat colors: light blue and pink, respectively). The name got a couple of Fandom Nods in the comic.
    • "Cotton Condy" for Roxy/Meenah (the pre-Scratch Condesce).
    • "Pumpkin Patch" for Dirk/Jake (based on uu's comment on their orange and green chat colors), though the significantly more ridiculous "Pistol Pony Rodeo" is arguably even more common.
    • "Les8ifins" for Aranea/Meenah, combining their typing quirks, or "Gillfronds".
    • "Windicuffs" for John/Jake, as breath is John's aspect and Jake is fond of Good Old Fisticuffs.
    • "Whip My Heir" for Aradia/John, combining John's class and Aradia's pre-death preferred weapon.
    • "Subglub" for Grand Highblood/Condesce; GH is the leader of the Subjugglators, and the Condesce is an aquatic troll.
    • "Kanned Tuna" for Kankri/Mituna.
    • "2% Milk" for Sollux/Equius (2 is Sollux's number motif and Equius likes milk and uses "%" in his typing quirk).
    • "I Just Had A Social Justice Aneurysm" for Dirk/Kanaya.
    • "[surname]cest" for pairings with the trolls and their ancestors or the kids and their guardians (e.g. "Vantascest" for Karkat/Kankri).
    • This has been evolved to an art form in the fandom, with creative names like "Texas Chainsaw Massacre" being a ship name for Dirk (who was born in what amounts to Texas) and Caliborn — the Big Bad who has no qualms about murder in massive numbers, going as far as to annihilate the afterlife, being auspisticised by Kanaya — whose main weapon is a chainsaw.
    • As ridiculous as the above, and semi-based on canon events, is "Separation of Church and State", for an auspisticising of Gamzee (religious Highblood) and Terezi (aspiring Legislacerator) by either Rose or Kanaya.
    • "Breathalyzer" for John/Roxy, as John has the Breath aspect, and Roxy used to be an alcoholic. Other names include Roxygen (another air pun) and Void of Air/Void of Heir (this one riffing on Roxy's Void aspect and John's Heir class).
    • "Blue's Clues" for John/Terezi. John has a prominent blue color motif, while Terezi is obsessed with criminal investigations.
    • "We are Leijon" for any pairing of Nepeta and her ancestors (a play on their last name, Leijon).
    • "Motherfucker" for Gamzee/Roxy (Roxy is the post-Scratch Mom Lalonde, and "motherfucker" is Gamzee's favorite word).
    • "Half & Half" for Eridan/Tavros (both wound up sliced in half).
• Standard practice in the Megatokyo fandom is to refer to a ship by the first initials of the characters, separated an "x" (e.g. Piro/Miho > PxM=, Piro/Kimiko > PxK, Largo/Erika > LxM, etc).
• Sleepless Domain has an in-universe example: Bud comes up with two ship names for Undine/Heartful Punch: Heartful Wave and Water Punch.
• Templar Arizona: Fans who ship E.J. and Biggs are committing an act of Elliot-cest.

Web Original

• Critical Role: Percy/Vex is sometimes called Hunter's Hex, after their signature spells, Hex and Hunter's Mark, which have very similar effects ^* Specifically, an extra 1d6 damage to one target whenever they hit it with an attack; they have, at least once, Hexed and Hunter's Marked the same quarry. Less commonly, they're also known as "Bad News Bears" after his big gun and her...well, bear.
  • The slightly less common Percy/Keyleth goes by Guns n' Roses, because Percy is a gunslinger and Keyleth is a druid.
  • Perc'ildan - Percy/Vax - has been going by Shooting Daggers.
• A post on Tumblr mocks the widespread usage of this by making up a shipping name (Candy in the Wind) and calling it so vague that it could mean anything up to Aang/Charlie Bucket.
• TV Tropes: Look no further than The Ship Yard.

Western Animation

• 3-2-1 Penguins!: Zidgel X Midgel has been named "Gay Space Penguins", as homosexuality is observed in penguins often.
• Adventure Time:
  • The ship Bubbline (Princess Bubblegum/Marceline) also goes by "Sugarless Gum", thanks to lyrics in one of Marceline's song about her not being sugary and the fact that Princess Bubblegum is made of gum.
  • There's also Finn/Flame Princess, which is known as Righteous Flame.
  • Lemongrab + Princess Bubblegum = Pink Lemonade.
• Despite not being all that popular, even the Alpha Teens on Machines fandom has a term for at least the Hawk/Shark pairing — Seabird. Yet the only hinted pairing, Axel/Lioness, remains blank.
• Arcane:
  • As with League of Legends itself, if you're looking for the Caitlyn/Vi fanart, it'll be under "Piltover's Finest", named after the hidden passive between the two in-game.
  • Jinx/Ekko is referred to as "Timebomb", since the former is a Mad Bomber and the latter has time powers.
• Avatar: The Last Airbender:
  • For the Brother–Sister Incest ships, "Zucest" or "Fireshipping" for Zuko/Azula and "Kacest" or "Watercest" for Katara/Sokka shipping.
  • On tv.com, the fandom couldn't decide between Sokki and Sukka for Sokka/Suki because they both sounded too much like either character's name, so a compromise was made. They call it George. More commonly it is just "Sukka" though.
• Beavis and Butt-Head: The pairing of the main duo is referred to as "Buttshipping" by some supporters.
• Ben 10: Ben/Gwen is referred to as "Bwen", "Bencest" or "Cousinshipping". Kevin/Gwen has also been named "Forceshipping" (after Ben 10: Alien Force, the sequel series where it inexplicably became Canon).
• Carmen Sandiego: The Carmen/Gray pairing is called Red Crackle by fans, after the former's signature colors and the latter's code name.
• Code Lyoko:
  • The naming theme is much simpler, using the first initials of the characters involved: UxY (Ulrich and Yumi), JxA (Jeremie and Aelita) and the like.
  • Though the Jeremie and Aelita ship did get dubbed Jerlita by their common voice actress.
• In Codename: Kids Next Door, we have these for shippers of the following couplings:
  • Cherry Luvers: Numbuh 1 and Numbuh 5.
  • Courting Commanders: Numbuh 1 and Numbuh 362.
  • Closet Keepers: Numbuh 2 and Numbuh 86.
  • Panda Warriors: Numbuh 3 and Numbuh 4.
  • Soda Junkies: Numbuh 23 and Numbuh 35.
  • Desk Jockeys: Numbuh 60 and Numbuh 362.
  • Giraffe Ninjas: Numbuh 2 and Numbuh 5.
  • Yelling Troopers: Numbuh 60 and Numbuh 86.
  • Koala Pirates: Numbuh 83 and Numbuh 84.
  • Moonbabes: Numbuh 86 and Numbuh 362.
• Danny Phantom fandom is filled with this. Danny/Sam is Amethyst Ocean (referring to their eye colors), Danny/Valerie is Gray Ghost, Danny/Paulina is Shallow Sapphire, Johnny/Kitty is Black Cat, Jack/Maddie is Moronic Genius, Danny/Vlad is Pompous Pep or Endangered Species, Tucker/Sam is Veggie Burger and so forth. This includes pairings with characters that barely interact with or share little to no romantic interests such as: Jazz/Clockwork is Timely Intelligence, Danny/Star is Phantom Satellite and so on and on. There's even one for the Danny Fenton/Danny Phantom pairing (Pitch Pearl). And this is just the icing on the cake. Here's a more detailed list. The ones that are most commonly used are Pompous Pep, Pitch Pearl, and on occasion Swagger Bishie (Danny/Dash). Most of the other ones are rarely seen in the fandom (and if they are, they're called by the character's names - DannyxSam is more common than Amethyst Ocean).
• Detentionaire has a lot of punny ship names, like Synchro N' Kitty for Biffy/Lee, Heart of Glam for Biffy/Kimmie and Silver Martini for Cam/Brandy. There's even a list.
• The Dude, That's My Ghost! fandom has come up with "ectofeature" and "bromighost" to refer to Billy/Spencer, although the latter might refer more to their bromance.
• Gravity Falls:
  • Dipper and Mabel shippers call it "Pinecest."
  • The other pair of shipped Pines twins—Stanley and Stanford—are known as Stancest, to avoid any confusion with the above-mentioned ship.
  • Crossover Ship "Pinescone" is an interesting half-portmanteau, half-idiosyncratic (and punny) example — "Pines" refers to Dipper, while "cone" refers to Wirt from Over the Garden Wall and his pointy red hat.
• Hilda: The common Ships That Pass in the Night pairing of Johanna/Kaisa is called "Sketchbook" as a reference to their professions (Johanna's a graphic designer, Kaisa's a librarian).
• Invader Zim fandom seems to prefer four-letter acronyms of the form XAYR — (Character X) And (Character Y) Romance. For example, ZAGR stands for "Zim and Gaz romance," ZADR for "Zim and Dib romance," DATR for "Dib and Tak romance" and RAPR for "Red and Purple romance." Generally the more important character's initial is put first. This mostly works because those four pairings make up the vast majority of popular ships. The rare GIR ship uses "Gr" for his initial to prevent confusion. "ZADF" is also used for "Zim and Dib friendship," while ZADE is sometimes used for "Zim and Dib enmity" (i.e., actually keeping things canon). This is occasionally used for other relationships, but it's pretty rare.
• Miraculous Ladybug: The term for shipping the pre-release versions of the leads, Marinette and Felix, was "Lucky Charm". Post-release, the fandom uses "Miraculous Love Square" to refer to the love square created by the show's double case of Loves My Alter Ego. The four individual interactions that make up the Square have Portmanteau Couple Names — see that page for more info.
  • Beta couple Alya and Nino have an Idiosyncratic Portmanteau Couple Name as "DJWi-Fi".
  • The polyship of Kagami, Felix, Luka, and Marinette is called Ice Art. This is due to Kagami being an Ice Queen, Felix being cold, and Luka and Marinette being artistic types.
• Moon Girl and Devil Dinosaur (2023): Some Lunella and Casey shippers call them "Mediamoon", due to Casey's love of social media and Lunella being Moon Girl.
• My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic:
  • While most shippers follow the Portmanteau rubric, some Twilight Sparkle/Rainbow Dash shippers like to call it Reading Rainbow.
  • Shipping Derpy Hooves with Doctor Whooves is often called Time Bubbles
  • There's the highly-amusing "Marshmallow Coco" for Rarity/Coco Pommel.
  • In a similar vein, the rare and inexplicable Maud Pie/Coco Pommel ship gets called "Coco Pebbles".
  • Celestia/Luna shipping is often referred to as "Princest" (in that they're both Princesses as well as sisters)
• The more popular Ninjago ships among the pairings between the ninjas (or at least the ones with obvious word connections between the partners) have names combining their respective elements. Canon ships like Jay x Nya are usually portmanteau couple names instead.
  • Cole and Kai = Lava Shipping
  • Cole and Zane = Glacier Shipping
  • Jay and Zane = Techno Shipping (Technically, not an element-related name. Rather, it's Inventor + Robot)
  • Kai and Lloyd = Greenfire Shipping
• Over the Garden Wall:
  • The Fan-Preferred Couple of Wirt and Beatrice is called "Infinite Eyerolls" (which is a good description of much of their interaction).
  • Maybe Ever After couple Wirt/Sara is known as "Poetic Bee", due to Wirt's love of poetry and Sara's position as her school's bee mascot.
• For The Powerpuff Girls, shippers of the Powerpuffs and the Rowdyruffs name them by their colour sceme (with the occasional Powerpunk Girl thrown in).
  • Reds for Blossom and Brick (and/or Berserk)
  • Blues for Bubbles and Boomer (and/or Brat)
  • Greens for Buttercup and Butch (and/or Brute)
• South Park has mostly Portmanteau Couple Names, but the ship for Kyle and Kenny is known as K2.
• Star Wars Rebels normally uses Portmanteau Couple Names for its ships, but occasionally you'll see Ezra and Sabine referred to as "Bluebean" or "Bluebird" (the first part refers to his Fan Nickname "Blueberry" due to his season 1+2 haircut; the latter is either a phonetic spelling of 'Bine or a reference to her last name).
• Steven Universe:
  • The fandom has one for the Sapphire/Ruby ship which is both incredibly obvious if you know the context, but also super-spoilery: Garnet. It's not often that two characters fuse into a single being as a manifestation of their love, but it does make ship naming fairly easy.
  • "Sworn to the Sword" has inspired some fans to start calling the Steven/Connie pairing "Jam Buds".
  • The Amethyst/Garnet/Pearl ship (sometimes including Rose Quartz) is often called Polygems.
  • The Pearl/Lapis Lazuli ship is sometimes called Saltwater.
  • The Sour Cream/Buck Dewey/Jenny Pizza ship is known as Poly Cool Kids.
• The Wander over Yonder fandom is full of these:
  • Wander/Hater: Skeleton Dance
  • Sylvia/Hater: Zboneak
  • Hater/Peepers: Death Glare
  • Sylvia/Peepers: Black Eye
  • Wander/Peepers: Wandering Eye
  • Hater/Awesome: Conquering Boyfriends
  • Awesome/Sylvia: Seahorse
  • Cashmere/Sylvia: Zbaaanak
  • And the pairing name for our two main protagonists is... Sylander.
• We Bare Bears: Since the bears are adoptive brothers, any ship putting them together is known as Bearcest.
• Young Justice:
  • Two schools of thought in Young Justice fandom: either squish two words related to their superhero personas, or use a single word that somehow relates to the ship. So M'gann and Conner is SuperMartian, after their superhero codenames, "Superboy" and "Miss Martian."
  • There is an episode where Kent Nelson tells Wally he needs to find a "spitfire" girlfriend to keep him in line, and starts to suggest Artemis before being cut off. When they're not Wall/Art, the Wally and Artemis ship is known as "Spitfire."
  • In "Humanity," after Robin spends most of the episode politely hitting on Zatanna, he starts to say "I'm trying to be all nonchalant here," and she responds with "be as chalant as you like." Hence, they are often called Chalant. Alternatively, some use BirdMagic.
    • Given the way Zatanna's powers work, other ships with her are often a particular word backwards: like "Snaibsel" with Artemis and "Mazahs" with Billy.
  • Robin and Kid Flash were mostly known as BirdFlash up until a scene in the tie-in comic where Wally complains about having to change costumes even though he's not "fresh." While Miss Martian's response was arguably funnier ("Oh, Wally, you're always fresh"), fangirls latched on Robin's "Whatever you say, freshness," and rechristened their ship.
  • Robin/Artemis is often referred to as "Traught" after the infamous scene where Robin snapped at Artemis "Well, get traught or get dead!"
  • Dick and Barbara are sometimes referred to as "Dibs", which serves as both a Portmanteau Couple Name, and to signify that the First Girl Wins.
  • The most idiosyncratic of the show's ship names is the one for the Robin/Wally/Artemis One True Threesome: "Museum Heist." It makes absolutely no sense within the context of the show, but if you shorten their names, what do you do during a museum heist? You Rob the Wall Art. Sometimes, it gets expanded to "Museum Heist on Fire", to include the red-headed Batgirl.
  • M'Gann and Lagoon Boy is usually "Angelfish", because that's L'gann's pet name for her, and it fits with M'gann being a beautiful flier and LB being rather fish-like in appearance.
  • Superboy/Wendy is often called "Neverland" because... well, Peter Pan reference.
  • Impulse/Blue Beetle has become fairly popular, gaining the name Speed Buggy, since Bart's a speedster and Jamie's alter ego is based on a scarab.
  • Wonder Girl/Robin has been referred to as "Left Field," as in "this ship came out of left field" given that it suddenly appears with no buildup at the end of the final episode.
• Winx Club: Some ship names allude to the characters' respective magic affinities. Bloom x Flora is called FireFlower (i.e., they are the fairies of the Dragon's Flame and Nature) and Bloom x Stella is SunFire (i.e., the latter is the fairy of the Sun, Moon, and Stars). The quasi-paedophilic shipping Bloom x Valtor (she's barely 18 and he's at the very least middle-aged when they meet) is called Sparksshipping because both of them are bearers of the Dragon's Flame—although just a Spark in his case—which originates in planet Sparks (aka Domino).

Real Life

• Dune (2021) co-star Oscar Isaac came up with "Space Sisters" for the ship between him and his "girlfriend", The Mandalorian star Pedro Pascal.
• Legendary British ice dancers Jayne Torvill and Christopher Dean (of "Bolero" fame) are "T n D" or "TND", for "Torvill and Dean". This is, as far as real life is concerned, strictly a platonic pairing, not that that's stopped the shippers.

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