The vibe coder naming checklist

You can have a working app in an afternoon now. That's exactly why the name deserves an hour: it's the one part of the project you can't regenerate later without losing what you built on it. Run this list top to bottom. Most items take a minute.

Before you search

1. Say it out loud three times. If you had to spell it for a friend, shorten it.
2. Count the characters. Under 15 and it fits every handle. Under 30 and it fits the App Store name field.
3. Type it on a phone keyboard. Autocorrect should leave it alone.
4. Write it in lowercase with no spaces. That's your handle and your domain. Does it still read as the name?
5. Search it with "app" after it. If the first page of results is a competitor, keep brainstorming.
6. Check the meaning in your top three markets. A word that's neutral in English can be a joke elsewhere.

The store

1. Search the App Store in every country you'll launch in. Ten results, in store order. An exact title match ends the conversation.
2. Search Google Play. The two stores index differently.
3. Look at the subtitles too. Three apps using your name in their subtitle means you'll fight for your own brand.
4. Remember what search can't show. A reserved, unpublished name is invisible. Treat "clear" as a strong signal, not a promise.

Domains

1. Check .com, then .app or .dev. For an app, the Google-run extensions are a good home, not a fallback.
2. Don't pay a parked-domain price yet. Buy it with revenue if the app works.
3. Skip hyphens and numbers. Nobody says them.

Handles

1. Check X, Instagram, TikTok and YouTube for the exact slug. X is the tightest at 15 characters.
2. If one is taken, add the same suffix everywhere. app, hq or get, on every network, even where the bare name was free.
3. Register the handles today. They have no seller if someone takes them tomorrow.

Developer namespaces

1. GitHub org. Almost never released once taken.
2. npm package name, if you'll ever publish anything.
3. Product Hunt slug, so your launch URL isn't name-2.

Before you build the brand

1. Search the USPTO and, if you sell outside the US, EUIPO and WIPO. Classes 9 and 42 for software. An available name is not a cleared name. Read trademarks 101.

One search covers 3 through 19

NameHQ checks both stores in up to five countries, seven TLDs, four handles and three dev namespaces in one go, and labels anything it can't confirm. Items 1, 2, 5, 6 and 20 are still yours, and they're the ones that matter most.