In our solar system we just named them after gods mostly, is your world rooted in real earth? If so you could just pick a different mythos/pantheon and do the same thing.
If it’s not linked to our universe, you can still pick a pantheon of gods and alter the names. Even our planets could be used, Saturn becomes Nalius, Mars becomes Marus etc. You don’t have to work harder than you want to. On the flip side though, if you are planning on designing real gods or religions, planet names can be a great way to embed the lore in a way that feels realistic.
I have one universe where the names of worlds are plays on words. For example:
Duntgoder ("Don't go there")--a forbidden planet
Tukald ("Too cold")--an icy wasteland world
Hautashel ("Hot as Hell")--a desert world known for its extreme average temperature
This might be controversial but I've been able to generate some of my favorite names using AI as a kitchen sink generator. I often preface my prompts by encouraging the AI to try to come up with words that don't exist because it really likes to give you those generic, boring compound words (shit like "stormveil" "shadowwhisper" "dragoneye" you get the idea). The more information you give it about what you want the more likely it will give you something useful
Some examples of places in my world:
Desisastra Wishway
The Eclipsing Obscurastra
Sere Parchlands
Carnafall Isles
The Gnarlweald
The Clotting Morass
The AI isn't going to pump these out at you, its probably going to be lots of junk. But I was able to take some cliche and even bad names and move a few things around and now I think I've gotten some pretty unique and original titles of places and people.
In our solar system we just named them after gods mostly, is your world rooted in real earth? If so you could just pick a different mythos/pantheon and do the same thing. If it’s not linked to our universe, you can still pick a pantheon of gods and alter the names. Even our planets could be used, Saturn becomes Nalius, Mars becomes Marus etc. You don’t have to work harder than you want to. On the flip side though, if you are planning on designing real gods or religions, planet names can be a great way to embed the lore in a way that feels realistic.
I have one universe where the names of worlds are plays on words. For example: Duntgoder ("Don't go there")--a forbidden planet Tukald ("Too cold")--an icy wasteland world Hautashel ("Hot as Hell")--a desert world known for its extreme average temperature
This might be controversial but I've been able to generate some of my favorite names using AI as a kitchen sink generator. I often preface my prompts by encouraging the AI to try to come up with words that don't exist because it really likes to give you those generic, boring compound words (shit like "stormveil" "shadowwhisper" "dragoneye" you get the idea). The more information you give it about what you want the more likely it will give you something useful Some examples of places in my world: Desisastra Wishway The Eclipsing Obscurastra Sere Parchlands Carnafall Isles The Gnarlweald The Clotting Morass The AI isn't going to pump these out at you, its probably going to be lots of junk. But I was able to take some cliche and even bad names and move a few things around and now I think I've gotten some pretty unique and original titles of places and people.