Looking for a name for a white cat? These are 90 names from the Mad Cat Cartel name book whose meaning points to a white coat: snow and frost, pearls and cotton, white sweets, and words for white and snow in many languages.
Every name comes with what it means and the kind of cat it suits. Tap Pick a name for your cat and the Cartel chooses one for you.
A fistful of packed snow, white and ready to throw, is the cheeky picture behind Snowball. It suits a kitten with a full white coat who ambushes ankles from behind doors and gathers speed with each lap of the hall. As a verb, snowball means to grow ever faster, and the Simpsons' cat is called Snowball II.
Each one with the note it got from the Cartel desk that approved it.
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Cat ID · 01 · Common
Snowball
Cute · Funny · English
A fistful of packed snow, white and ready to throw, is the cheeky picture behind Snowball. It suits a kitten with a full white coat who ambushes ankles from behind doors and gathers speed with each lap of the hall. As a verb, snowball means to grow ever faster, and the Simpsons' cat is called Snowball II.
Memo from the desk of Meowchi "Chi"
The lighting crew groans at a white cat, because white burns out on camera. Snowball made them earn every frame and the winter campaign came back flawless. Snowball has my blessing.
A gem grown by a living animal, the pearl forms in thin layers of nacre inside an oyster or mussel. Pearl sounds luminous and a little old-fashioned, like a grandmother's necklace. The cat behind it tends to be mild-mannered and pale, with a gleam to a white coat.
Memo from the desk of Lady Purrington
After dark, Pearl keeps her glow long after every lamp is switched off. Twice I failed to match it in silk. She does not pose; she waits to be noticed. Hang no harsh lamp over her basket, because hard light flattens a pearl.
In Japanese, shiro simply means white, a traditional name there for pale pets, and it goes to a snowy kitten who shows every speck of dust on a dark sofa. Written with a different character, shiro also means castle, so the plain colour word has a stately second side.
Memo from the desk of Cargo Katsuki
In our business a clean record outruns any truck. Shiro carries one in the name, since Japanese slang calls a cleared suspect shiro, and it walks through every inspection with its papers visibly in order.
Bianca is Italian for white, and it is the name of the seemingly meek younger sister in The Taming of the Shrew. It sits naturally on a spotless white cat whose mild manners hide a firm will of her own.
Memo from the desk of Miss Meowlin
Bianca is a gift against dark velvet and a disaster on cream upholstery. For her last sitting we reupholstered a whole lounge in charcoal. The upholsterer has sent her a Christmas card ever since, a loyalty most clients never earn me.
Cotton came to English from Arabic qutn by way of Old French coton, and Beatrix Potter named one of Peter Rabbit's sisters Cotton-tail. Soft as a cotton boll, it suits a white cat who prefers arms to the floor.
Memo from the desk of Stitch Romano
You get no shine and no tricks from cotton, which is why I trust the cloth and anyone named after it. This cat lets the tape measure go around its middle without protest, then falls asleep on the offcuts pile.
The sweet owes its name to the marsh mallow, a plant of salt marshes whose root paste went into the original recipe. Squashy and good-natured, the name promises a chunky cat who flattens into any cushion and bounces back unbothered.
Memo from the desk of Meowchi "Chi"
Marshmallow pairs total softness with a serious stare, the exact mix every cute brand chases. Put that face on one plush toy and the factory will need a second shift.
The warm, creamy white of old piano keys, ivory describes a pale cat with an unhurried manner who always looks freshly laundered. The word is soft and expensive-sounding, closer to candlelight than to snow.
Memo from the desk of Stitch Romano
In cloth, ivory is the hardest shade to get right, since one degree too yellow looks old. Ivory has the exact tone I beg the mills for. Each stitch in that colour shows. Regrettably, the cat sheds on all of them.
Read as snow or as happiness depending on the characters, Yuki is a Japanese given name open to either sex. Either sense points to a cat with a quiet, contented temperament, one that settles as softly as fresh snow and lifts the mood of a house. It also opens longer names, Yukiko and Yukio among them, so it sounds familiar and serene.
Memo from the desk of Cargo Katsuki
Snow is the one delay no dispatcher can argue with, yet nothing about a cat named Yuki ever runs late. When the snow starts, it will be at the window, logging every flake like freight on a manifest.
Snowy describes anything covered in snow or white as snow, a crisp, wintry word for a pale animal. A white cat of cool, unhurried manner fits it best, happiest on a cold windowsill watching the garden. English readers also know Snowy as Tintin's wire fox terrier, called Milou in Hergé's original French.
Memo from the desk of Meowchi "Chi"
I refuse to wear a white outfit anywhere near Snowy, as the runner-up white at any party is forgotten by dessert. Dress in navy or black when you hold the cat, so its coat stays the only white thing in any photo.
Eira is simply the Welsh word for snow, and its serene feel brings to mind a white cat who chooses the coolest spot in the house and watches the weather with complete calm. In Norway and Sweden it is also a girls' name drawn from Eir, the Norse goddess of healing, whose own name means help or mercy.
Memo from the desk of Miss Meowlin
At our winter gala, Eira was the one guest the photographers could not overexpose, white on white against the frosted terrace and perfectly composed. She holds her pose for every flash, says nothing to the press and leaves with every hair in place.
Egg whites whipped with sugar until they hold glossy peaks, meringue makes a fine name for a white cat with a light, springy step. Spoken, it opens softly and closes crisply, as airy in sound as the white peaks it names. A meringue is also delicate, and the name hints at a gentle nature that prefers a careful hand.
Memo from the desk of Meowchi "Chi"
It refuses every angle except its right profile, and after five days of proofs I have to agree with Meringue. The left-side shots now go straight to storage, untouched.
Ghost descends from gast, Old English for spirit or breath, and it settles on the silent cat who stares at an empty corner for minutes on end, as if greeting a visitor nobody else can see. Called softly at dusk, it keeps an eerie hush.
Memo from the desk of Capo Clawzano
Rule one of clean work: nobody should be sure you were there. Ghost leaves a warm dent in the duvet and nothing else. I admire that and distrust the duvet. Check under the covers before sitting on any bed here.
Birds puff up their feathers in a cold snap, trapping air as insulation, and Snow Puff borrows that winter swell along with the colour of fresh snow. It belongs on a white cat in a thick, long coat that fluffs itself out by the draughty back door, content and perfectly insulated.
Snowpuff fuses two light words, the way snowflake and snowball were formed, and it carries the hush of a winter morning. It names a cat who is white, long-coated and calm to the point of stillness, happiest asleep under a heap of folded laundry.
Snowbelle reads at first as snowbell, the garden name for Styrax, small trees hung with white, bell-shaped flowers, and one extra e swaps the bell for belle, the French beautiful. The double reading suits a white cat of quiet, wintry beauty who seems to bloom in the coldest room of the house.
Snowelle fits a white cat with a cool, unbothered calm, and it pairs English snow with -elle, borrowed from French. Its sound lands close to Noelle, the girls' name from French noel, Christmas, so the coinage brings winter holidays as well as frost.
Snowel tucks snow into Noel, the everyday French word for Christmas, so a weather word picks up the sound of carols and wrapped presents. The festive ring wants a white cat who keeps vigil under the tree every December and knocks the lowest baubles loose.
The cat here is white, with fur that looks freshly fallen and feels like lining fabric: snow for the colour, silk for the hand. Both are plain English words, run together like a label on a fabric swatch. The double s in the middle keeps it hushed, a name to murmur rather than shout.
Snowy Paw is one print pressed into fresh snow: small, clean and quiet. The cat for it wears white mittens and moves about without a sound, leaving no trace behind. Called softly, the two words land as gently as the step they describe.
Snowybear sketches a polar bear in miniature, white and lumbering, padding through a drift. The cat behind it is unhurried and steady, claiming the coldest tile in summer and the warmest blanket in winter. Leaving the -y on snow keeps it soft, closer to a cuddly toy than an arctic chill.
A cool, composed white cat who warms only to a chosen few fits Snow Astrid, from Old Norse words for god and beautiful. Snow sets it in a Scandinavian winter with a hint of Andersen's Snow Queen. Astrid is royal too, borne by the Swedish princess who became queen of the Belgians, so the wintry pair sounds titled.
A cool, self-contained cat with a pale coat and an unbothered stare could carry Frostara, a coinage setting frost, the white crystals left on grass after a freezing night, before a graceful -ara ending. Together the parts sound wintry and composed, like a figure skater announced at the start of a program.
Frost, the white rime of a winter morning, takes the French -elle in Frostelle, a newly made name that sounds crisp and exact. The cat for it is white, cool and reserved, and accepts a stroke only on her own terms.
Frost is a word English shares with Swedish, Danish and Norwegian, and Frostrell attaches it to -rel, the diminutive ending of cockerel. This invented name sounds brisk and impish, like the first cold snap of autumn. Its cat is mischievous and pale-coated, leaving paw prints on every misted windowpane.
Little Yuki translates koyuki, Japanese for a light snowfall, written as little plus snow, and describes a gentle kitten who moves about the house so softly that nobody hears it come in. The image is hushed and wintry, while the English start keeps it close to home.
A cat who sits at a cold window to watch the weather is well named Yukimi, a Japanese girl's name that can be written to mean snow viewing. Yuki is snow and mi can mean seeing, though other kanji read as happiness or beauty instead. Snow viewing is an old winter pastime, and Yukimi holds that still, wintry charm.
Group 02 · 27 names
Pearl names for white cats
Pearls in English, Italian, Spanish, French and German, for a cat with a glow of her own. Duchess, the white mother cat of Disney's The Aristocats, joins them.
Duchess is the elegant mother cat in Disney's The Aristocats, refined, musical and endlessly patient with three unruly kittens. The title brings that same poise to a real cat, one who expects good manners from everyone and returns them with interest.
Bella Pearl puts a word of praise beside the classic gem of the jewellery box. A pearl is grown rather than cut, and the name carries that same finished polish with no visible effort. The cat it describes is white, poised on her feet and full of very definite opinions on who may lift her.
Bella and perla end alike, so Bella Perla, beautiful pearl, comes as a matched set, like two earrings. It calls up a reserved cat who keeps her charms shut away like a pearl in its shell, revealed only to the one person she trusts. Both are Italian given names too, so the pair can pass for a first and a middle name.
French calls an exceptional person who is hard to find la perle rare, the ideal find, and Belle Perle borrows that praise for a white cat who passes every test a new home can set, from a first vet visit to a first dinner party. Belle and Perle both close on a soft l, so the name shuts neatly, like the clasp on a strand.
Perla is the Spanish and Italian word for pearl, and both languages also give it to daughters. A calm cat in a pale coat, happiest when admired from a few steps away, suits it best. In Spanish-speaking families it is a familiar first name, and its polish never feels like a costume.
Used for girls in both French and Yiddish, Perle means pearl, a gem that grows layer by layer inside a shell. Polished and serene, it pictures a white cat who sits perfectly still on a dark cushion and lets the light do the work.
Perlina is Italian for a little pearl, and dressmakers use it for the glass beads stitched onto gowns. It flatters a white cat whose gleam is quiet and polished, the kind who likes admirers to keep a short distance. Perla itself names girls in Spanish and Italian, and this diminutive makes it delicate and intimate.
Pearl is perla in Spanish, and Perlita, its diminutive, suggests a cat with a pale, glossy coat and composed manners. The ending keeps the gem's polished look but adds warmth, like one pearl worn every day rather than kept in a velvet box.
Perlette gives perle, pearl, the -ette of Annette, so it reads as a pet name as much as a jewel. Picture a white kitten who grows into a cat with an obliging, good-natured streak, the kind every visitor wants to hold. In French, calling someone une vraie perle means they are a treasure, and the diminutive makes the praise fond.
Pearlina goes to a calm white cat of lustrous composure, and it stretches Pearl, an old-fashioned girls' name taken from the gem, with the -ina ending of Christina and Paulina. The stretched version sounds polished and slightly grand, like a leading lady from a touring company.
Pearllette adds -ette, the small-making ending of French, to pearl, a little pearl to hang on a white cat of delicate manners. The doubled l is unusual, since the expected spelling would be Pearlette, and it makes the name look fussy and hand-lettered. That extra letter matches a cat who likes everything arranged just so.
Pearlshade names the soft white of a pearl, the gem a mollusc builds in layers around an irritant. Shade here means a tint of a colour, so the compound reads as a quiet off-white, not a jewel. Freshly put together, it is a name for a lustrous white cat who is rarely bothered by anything.
Pearlwhisp is a white cat who drifts like a curl of pale smoke, named for pearl, with its soft lustre, and whisp, a respelling of wisp, something slight and hard to catch. Together the parts feel lustrous and fleeting, a word that is gone almost as soon as it is said.
Luna is the moon of the Romans, and a pearl is the pale gem that grows slowly inside a shell. The pairing settles nicely on a white cat that moves through the evening calmly and without hurry. Said together, moon and pearl give off one soft glow, a big light and its smaller copy.
Perle is French for pearl, and petite before it reads as a jeweller's note on one fine stone, chosen over a whole strand. Both words open on p, so the pair is crisp and quick to say. Expect a cat with dainty manners who eats in neat, measured mouthfuls and leaves the bowl tidy.
Italian travel writing likes to call an unspoilt village or cove a perla, a gem that rewards whoever finds it, and piccola scales it down to a little gem. The cat to match is low-key, with a charm visitors only discover on a second or third visit. Used as a name, it holds both meanings at once, the jewel and the hidden place.
Perlino, from perla, pearl, is at home on a white cat who stashes treasures such as earrings and hair ties beneath the sofa. Horse breeders use perlino for a bay horse whose coat is washed to pale cream by a double dose of the cream gene. The diminutive ending makes it sound affectionate, a pearl kept in a pocket.
Italian supplies both halves of Perluna, perla for pearl and luna for moon. The blend is invented, and it doubles the paleness, one gleam from the sea and one from the night sky. Here the cat is white and luminously calm, with a liking for the window seat after dark.
Perlune pairs French perle, pearl, with lune, moon, and the white cat it calls for glows best in the evening. The pairing is invented, though each half is a plain French noun. Read together, the two words share a pale glow, and the join is so smooth the blend sounds settled.
Perla means pearl in both Italian and Spanish and is given to girls in each, and dolce before it keeps the jewel fond, not grand. Picture a mild, unflappable white cat who takes every upset in her stride, as smooth in temper as her namesake is to the touch.
In French a freshwater pearl is a perle d'eau douce, and Douce Perle lifts the gentle word out of that phrase and sets it before the gem. Think of a white cat with a mild temper and a fascination for running water, who dips a paw in the bowl and watches the drops fall before she drinks.
Colloquially, and with a smile, Germans call a capable household helper eine Perle, so Kleine Perle is both a little pearl and a little household treasure. The cat in question is white and supervises every chore, inspecting the mop, riding in the clothes basket and checking each drawer before it shuts.
Liebe Perle pictures a steadfast cat, pale as her namesake, who has kept the same habits for years: the same cushion, the same supper hour, the same slow tour of the garden at dusk. Love and pearl already meet in German custom, where thirty years of marriage is celebrated as the Perlenhochzeit, the pearl wedding.
Süße Perle is for a white cat who is sweet with every visitor but saves her loyalty for one person, trotting to the door at the sound of one particular key. Besides the gem, Perle is also teasing, old-fashioned German slang for a girlfriend who stays true, and that adds a faithful edge to the sweetness.
Sugar Mimi Perla strings together a kitchen-cupboard endearment, the fond Mimi and Perla, pearl in Spanish. All white crystals and lustre, it is sugary without being sticky. Its cat is quiet-voiced and polite, asking for attention with one soft chirp, never a howl.
Coco and pearls have belonged together since Coco Chanel made long ropes of them part of her look, and Bunny tips that memory toward the nursery. Its cat is poised and pale, until a loose string sends her skipping after it like a kitten.
Bella Perla is Italian for beautiful pearl, and with Fluffy added it names a cat in a long white coat that looks freshly groomed even straight out of a nap. The two Italian words nearly rhyme, which gives the name a lilt, and Fluffy keeps it from sounding like a jewellery shop.
Group 03 · 10 names
Fluffy white cat names
Cotton balls and snow bunnies, for a cat who is mostly white fluff.
A ripe cotton boll splits open into a puff of white fibre, the raw stuff of cotton wool. British English talks of wrapping someone in cotton wool when they are shielded from every bump, sometimes more than they need. The cat it calls for is pampered, wears a fluffy white coat and assumes there is a soft landing wherever it jumps.
Cottonball borrows the puff of cotton kept for make-up and first aid, and it suits a white cat who naps curled so tight that no paw shows. The pairing works twice over, cotton for the colour and the softness, ball for that compact, tucked-in shape.
Cottonfluff is a gentle cat who melts into any lap and stays put until the lap gives up. The word names the white, weightless bits that drift off cotton and collect in pockets and tumble dryers, so the name is homely before it is pretty. On a long white coat it also praises how light the cat feels.
Cottonia adds -ia, the ending of Britannia and Caledonia, to cotton, so the word conjures an imaginary soft country. The cat for it is a homebody who rules a realm of blankets and patrols the bed as private territory. It could also stand as a first name in the family of Antonia.
Cottonel is a low-fuss name for a cat who is easygoing and comfortable anywhere, the way cotton is the cloth people reach for every day. The clipped -el ending works like French -elle, which shrinks a rue, a street, to a ruelle, a lane.
Baby Yuki Puff is a white kitten in long, snowy fur, like powder kicked up from a fresh drift, because yuki means snow. Baby holds it all at kitten age, and the hunter in it pounces at anything moving under a blanket.
Snow is yuki in Japanese, so Yuki Puff paints a white cat in a long, loose coat, one that sends up a cloud whenever it shakes. The picture is powder snow knocked from a branch, falling as a soft puff, never a clump, and the name as a whole has that quiet, wintry hush.
Yuki is Japanese for snow, and Puff gives that snow a shape, like the soft cap that settles on a fence post overnight. Shouted across a garden, it sounds light and cold at once. It reads best on a white cat with flowing fur that sits at the window through every snowfall, watching the flakes come down.
With snow first and the rabbit last, Yuki Bun pictures a hare in its winter white, the coat mountain hares grow for the snow. It suits a white cat who crosses the room in quick double hops and freezes mid-hop at every creak. Bun was an old Scottish pet word for a rabbit, the source of bunny.
Snow in Japanese is yuki, and adding the English bun makes a snow bun, soft and drowsy. It names a pale cat that tucks itself into a tight bundle on cold mornings. The mix of a Japanese word and an English endearment keeps it light, easy to say softly at bedtime.
Group 04 · 8 names
Sweet white names
Sugar, coconut and soft white treats, for the sweetest cat in the house.
Sugar came into English via Arabic sukkar, ultimately from Sanskrit śarkarā, which originally meant gravel or grit. As a name it is purely affectionate, right for a cat who presses its cheek against any hand within reach. Sweethearts have been called sugar in English since at least 1930, so people answer to it too.
A sugar cube is a pressed block of sugar, tidy and sized for a single cup. The word itself sounds bright, neat and treat-sized. It belongs on a compact cat who sparkles with energy for ten minutes and then dissolves into an afternoon nap.
Coconut owes its name to the Portuguese and Spanish coco, a grinning face, because the three dark pores on the shell look like eyes and a mouth. The name is hard on the outside and soft within, describing a cat who keeps visitors politely at a distance and melts for one person.
Vanilla traces back to the Spanish vainilla, a diminutive of vaina, pod, for the cured seed pods of a climbing orchid native to Mexico, and in everyday English vanilla can also mean plain and conventional. Both senses meet in an easygoing cat of mild manners, happy with any lap, any routine and any visitor who offers a hand.
Borrowed via Japanese from the Chinese doufu, tofu is curd set from soy milk and usually pressed into blocks. On a cat it reads as mild and easygoing, suited to one that soaks up the mood of any room. Japanese cooks call the soft kind kinugoshi, silk-filtered, and the firm kind momen, cotton, homely words that suit its gentle character.
Milk mochi is a real sweet, glutinous rice flour cooked with milk and sugar until it sets softer and creamier than ordinary mochi. Picture a white kitten as gentle as that sweet, still in its milk teeth and mouthing fingers without ever biting down. The milk does double duty, for the pale colour and for those first teeth.
Warm a marshmallow and it swells, soft and pillowy, so a marshmallow puff is the sweet at its most inflated. Picture a chunky cat who spreads wider and wider by the fire, ending up with twice the rug it started on.
Lord Marshmallow ennobles a round cat as soft as the sweet itself, one who gives a little under a hug and then springs back into shape. The word itself is long and cushioned, and its doubled m sounds keep it murmuring. The Lord adds pomp to a sweet with no backbone at all, and that contrast leaves the name tender, never silly.
Group 05 · 10 names
White and snow in other languages
Italian bianco, Russian bely and sneg, Turkish beyaz and pamuk, Thai khao, Icelandic snjór and Korean seol.
Bianco is the Italian word for white, the same adjective found in vino bianco and in Monte Bianco, which is how Italians name Mont Blanc. It sounds crisp rather than sugary, more tablecloth than snowflake. A white cat suits it best, ideally one who keeps that coat spotless.
Russian bel- means white, as in bely and belaya, and Belya puts a soft, affectionate ending on that root. Snowy and quiet, it describes a white cat who vanishes into freshly washed laundry until two eyes open in the pile.
Beloura starts from bel-, the Slavic root for white found in Russian belyi and in Belarus, and finishes with an invented -oura, so the whole thing is a coinage. Picture a white cat of gentle, almost luminous presence in a dim hallway. Because bel is also Italian for beautiful, many listeners catch a second compliment in it.
Beyaz means white in Turkish and belle means beautiful in French, so the name introduces a pale cat whose looks do the talking before she does. Alliteration keeps the two languages close together, and as a pair they could be the heroine of an old-fashioned romance.
The Thai breed name Khao Manee means white jewel, and Khao, its first half, lends a cat with a pure white coat a clean, single-word call. Used alone it is brief and gentle, one clean syllable for one clean colour.
A white cat whose temper is cool and unhurried takes well to Snegara, built on sneg, the Russian word for snow that also gives Snegurochka, the Snow Maiden of Russian folk tales. Snegara itself is made up, and the -ara ending gives it the sound of a heroine from a winter story nobody wrote down.
Snjór is Icelandic for snow, and Snjoria rounds it off with the -ia of Gloria and Victoria to make a new name. It belongs on a white cat who launches itself into anything soft and powdery, from laundry piles to fresh bedding, with a playful thud. Pronounced with the Icelandic j, which matches an English y, it comes out close to snyoria.
Seol, the Sino-Korean reading of the character for snow, runs into an invented -ara in Seolara, a cool name suited to a white cat that holds itself apart. The same 雪 opens Seoraksan, usually translated as Snow Rock Mountain, which lends the syllable a high, cold ring. The -ara ending is decoration, so the snow carries all of the meaning.
Pamuk is Turkish for cotton, and with pearl beside it the name describes a white cat whose coat is soft and lustrous and who settles gently into laps. Each word is pale and rounded, one picked from a field and one from an oyster, so the pairing stays tender, never grand.
Shiro is Japanese for white, so Shiro Claw is the hard seltzer brand White Claw with its first word swapped into Japanese. The Japanese half keeps the brand's rhythm while giving it a cooler feel, as if imported under a quieter label. It names a white cat, quick and precise with its paws, who taps a toy twice before deciding to strike.
Group 06 · 6 names
Snow and sea goddesses
Pale goddesses of winter and the sea, from Norse and Greek myths.
Skadi left her sea-god husband Njord because the screaming gulls kept her awake, and Skadi Frost names a white cat who picks one quiet spot to sleep and defends it. With frost added, the manner stays cool and the coat pale. Both halves are short and hard, so the name lands like a crack of ice.
Skadi is the giantess of Norse myth tied to winter, mountains, skiing and bowhunting, who marched on the gods in armour to avenge her father and accepted compensation instead. The cat to match is cool and composed, stalking toy mice with total seriousness and expecting payment in treats afterwards. With Frostpaw on the end, the winter theme becomes literal: a white print in fresh snow.
Skadi is the Norse giantess and goddess of mountains, winter and bowhunting, who travels the snow on skis. Add Icewhisk and you get a white cat with a cool, self-possessed manner who stalks the cold floor tiles and pounces on anything that twitches. The coined half reads as a frosted whisker, quick and cold to say.
The first half belongs to the goddess of youth in Norse tradition, keeper of the fruit that stops the gods from growing old, and the second adds a white plume of a tail. The cat it calls for is pale and forever young at heart, still chasing its own tail at an age when most cats have given that up.
Leucothea, Greek for white goddess, is the sea deity the mortal queen Ino became, and her cat is a pale, gentle one who comes running whenever someone in the house is upset. In the Odyssey she rises from the waves and lends her veil to the shipwrecked Odysseus so the sea cannot drown the hero, and the story adds rescue to beauty.
Tethys, the Titan sea goddess who mothered the great rivers, is a namesake for a white cat with a calm streak who likes running taps and pats the drinking water before lapping. With Pearl on the end, it takes on a polished, sea-made shine. Saturn's icy moon Tethys carries it too, so it sits as easily in astronomy as in myth.
Group 07 · 3 names
Ghostly white cat names
For a white cat who appears without a sound and vanishes the same way.
A paw shooting from beneath the bed at passing ankles, with no visible cat attached, is the whole idea of Ghost Claw. The image is playful and spooky at the same time, a haunting reduced to one quick swipe. As a name it is easy to say in a stage whisper, which matches the prank.
Ghost Fang pairs a thing you never hear coming with a thing you certainly feel, and the result is eerie, not cruel. It describes a cat that drifts across the carpet in silence and announces itself only with one swift nip at a trailing hand. Said softly, the name has the hush of a campfire story with a bite at the end.
Ghostpaws describes a cat whose soft pads land with a hushed step, so it can appear beside you on the bed with no footsteps to warn you. Cats walk on their toes, and the thick pads muffle each footfall. The plural softens it into a comic endearment, as if the haunting stopped at the ankles.
All white cat names, A to Z
Open the full list, A to Z. Tap any name to read what it means and issue its passport.
The classics come from white things: Snowball, Pearl, Cotton and Marshmallow. For something less common, try a word for white or snow in another language, like Shiro, Bianca, Yuki or Eira.
Are white cats deaf?
Not all of them, but white cats are more likely to be born deaf, especially those with blue eyes. Older studies cited by Louisiana State University found deafness in 65 to 85 percent of white cats with two blue eyes and in 17 to 22 percent of white cats without blue eyes. If you are not sure about your cat, ask your vet for a hearing check.
What does Shiro mean?
Shiro is Japanese for white, a traditional name in Japan for pale pets. Yuki is the Japanese word for snow, and it can also mean happiness, depending on how it is written.
Do these names work for a cat that is only partly white?
Many do. A name like Snowy Paw suits a cat with white feet. For black and white cats, see the tuxedo names on our black cat names page.
Do cats really recognize their names?
Yes. A 2019 study from the University of Tokyo, published in Scientific Reports, found that pet cats can tell their own name apart from similar sounding words. Whether your cat comes when you call is another matter.
How many white cat names are on this page?
This page has 90 names from the Mad Cat Cartel name book, picked because their meaning points to a white coat. The Cat Name Generator has more than 4,500 names if you want more choice.
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Tell the Cartel about your cat in two questions. It picks from more than 4,500 names and issues a passport with what the name means.
A fistful of packed snow, white and ready to throw, is the cheeky picture behind Snowball. It suits a kitten with a full white coat who ambushes ankles from behind doors and gathers speed with each lap of the hall. As a verb, snowball means to grow ever faster, and the Simpsons' cat is called Snowball II.
Chi
Lady Purrington
C. Katsuki
Miss Meowlin
R. Romano
Clawzano
