If you just got a new best friend and are looking for awesome dog names for your new pooch, I hope to give you some great ideas.  I also hope to get some great ideas from you.  If you have some awesome dog names please leave them in a comment.

So how do you pick a name?  Should you be gender specific?  Should it fit the breed?  Well I can tell you the dog really isn’t going to care. It should be something that you like and will be happy saying hundreds of times a week.

I have a friend that has a little 4 pound mix that looks like a dust mop with legs and a little bark you can barely hear.  She is the cutest thing.  Her name is Cujo.  Obviously it doesn’t fit in any way but I think the name is perfect.

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There are some general guidelines you should follow.  Don’t pick a name that has too many syllables.  An ideal name will be  1 or 2 syllables. It’s not a rule that is written in stone though.  You can fudge here a little since most dogs can’t count that well anyway.  Kind of like congress.

Don’t use a name that sounds like a dog command.  Most dogs don’t know the difference between Mitt and sit or Ray and stay. Of course if you’re not going to train the dog it really doesn’t matter.

It should be something that comes easily to the lips.  Some people like to use funny names, but don’t use something that is going to embarrass you.  I heard of a guy that named his dog Guess.  You can imagine his amusement when people would ask the dog’s name. “What’s your dog’s name?” “Guess”

Don’t use a name that sounds like the name or nickname of someone else in the family.  You don’t want the dog jumping in your lap when you call someones name, especially if it’s in the middle of a passionate encounter.  It can also be very confusing if it sounds like the name of a child.  Especially for the child.

Don’t use a word that is going to be used often.  I wouldn’t want to name my dog Tequila, Beer or Fajita.  It would be really confused.

Make sure that you choose an awesome dog name the dog will grow into if it’s a pup. You want the name to grow with the dog. You don’t want to be calling your German Shepard “Fluffy” when you are trying to stop it from biting the mailman.

There are many ways to pick  awesome dog names.  You can be descriptive of the way the dog looks.  Rusty for a Irish Setter, Spot for a Dalmatian or Shorty for a Great Dane.  They can reflect the origin of the dog, the sex of the dog or the personality.  The name you choose can reflect nothing.  It can be a name or word you like. Dogs really don’t care what their names are.

So here are a few awesome dog names to get us going: Elvis, Lassie, Buddy, Shadow, Bandit, Badger, Astro, Lady, Killer, Bruiser, Freeway, Midnight, Sparky, Radar, Lucky, Frisbee, Speedy, Comet, Coco, Hero, Tango, Cowboy, Rusty, Barkley, Big Mac, Poseidon, Dozer, Tequila, Chico, Jalapeno, Alpha, Apollo, Blackjack, Biscuit, Bonzo, Zeus and Cujo.

This is just a small sample of what is on the following pages.  Feel free to send me your favorites if they are not on any of the pages.