Riku can also be written with the kanji 璃 (ri) meaning "glassy, lapis lazuli" (with the Go-On and Kan-On Reading) combined with 来 (ku) meaning "to come from a remote location, to go to a far location" (with the Kun Reading).
Riku (璃来) Miura (三浦), born in 2001, is a Japanese feminine pair skater. With her skating partner, Ryuichi Kihara, she is the 2023 World champion, 2022 World silver medalist, the 2023 Four Continents champion, the 2022–23 Grand Prix Final champion, a two-time ISU Grand Prix gold medalist, the 2021 CS Autumn Classic champion, and the 2020 Japanese national champion. They also are bronze medalists in the team event at the 2022 Winter Olympics.
Riku was used as a girl's name back in the olden days. Based on some research that I've done (gathering names from passenger lists and US census data), Riku was a pretty uncommon name to have in the late Edo period and the Meiji & Taishō periods.2 syllable names were preferred at the time, more so before the Meiji period, which is why Riku was seen as a girl's name. Towards the 2nd half of the Meiji period and the Taishō period, those types of names were quickly shunted out in popularity by names ending in *ko.
I love the Japanese name Riku. It's a good, solid, strong name. I first heard this name from the game Kingdom Hearts, like many others.
― Anonymous User 1/2/2015
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A little boy that I know has the kanjis 莉翔 (jasmine, to fly/soar), which is very odd because 莉 is normally used for girls, since it has a flower meaning. And the pronunciation for 翔 is not normally 'ku.' Japan is in the generation where they want to give their children wonderful (or sometimes puzzling) meanings for names, but unreadable unless specified.
This strikes me as one of those generic otaku names that Japanese media seems to overuse and weeaboos overuse for their OCs even more. Like Sora, it's probably due to Kingdom Hearts. It also reminds me of those crappy Sora/Riku fanfics that demonize Kairi. Plus, I didn't like Riku that much when I played Kingdom Hearts.
I love the name Riku. It's unique and foreign and it comes from one of my favorite video games. It makes me think of rock or stone without sounding to macho.
Rikku is the name of one of the characters in Final Fantasy 10 and one of the three female leads in the sequel to Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy X-2. She's my favorite Final Fantasy Character. Ever. It's also pronounced like Riku from Kingdom Hearts.
This website says this name is masculine, but I know of at least one instance where the name was used for a female.Harada Riku (Riku Harada in Western order) is a character in the manga/anime D. N. Angel. She is the eldest Harada child--Risa, her younger identical twin sister, is Daisuke's first love interest. He later becomes invovled with Riku herself.
― Anonymous User 6/28/2007
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Riku was the name of a character on the video game "Kingdom Hearts". Originally, Riku was the true Keyblade wielder, but when he fell sway to Darkness the Keyblade was given to Riku's best friend, Sora.