Before its formal description, it was referred to as a small, "dwarf" or "pygmy" form of Bryde's whale by various sources (including Ohsumi 1978, Wada and Numachi 1991, Carwardine 1995, Perrin et al. 1996, Kahn 2001, LeDuc and Dizon 2002, Kato 2002, among many others). The common name and specific epithet commemorates Japanese cetologist Hideo Omura