Hawaii-born cast members Jason Scott Lee and Tia Carrere helped the writers with dialog and accents.
The name "Lilo" means "Generous One" and its origin is Hawaiian. It can also be interpreted as "Lost" and this would give the song title "He Mele No Lilo" a loose translation as "Lullaby of the Lost". The name Nani means "Beautiful" in Hawaiian.
Many of the aliens are inspired by Disney characters, including Piglet and Tigger.
Almost all of the landscape scenes in the movie are recognizable locations in Hawaii. This is especially true earlier in the movie when Lilo and Stitch are riding the bike around the island, and in the closing sequence.
Although it uses computer-colored (but hand-drawn) digital cels instead of hand-painted ones, this was the first Disney animated feature to use watercolor-painted backgrounds since Dumbo (1941). A conscious effort was made to give the film a warmer, more old-fashioned look than most other modern Disney films: this film does not use the "Deep Canvas" technique used in Tarzan (1999), Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001), or Treasure Planet (2002); it only contains about five shots which use either a "multiplane camera" or "3D camera" effect; and the use of tone mattes (shading/shadows on the characters) was kept to a minimum.
Along with The Princess and the Frog (2009), this is one of only two films from the Walt Disney Animation Studios released in the 2000s to meet with critical praise and make its money back in its initial theatrical run.
Like the live-action monster movie that appears briefly, photographs of Elvis Presley are real pictures and not animated drawings.
Originally, Stitch was going to be an intergalactic gangster, Jumba was going to be a disgruntled member of his gang who was left behind during a heist and was going after him as revenge, and the other members of the gang would have been the ones who came to get him in the third act. The filmmakers felt that Stitch was more sympathetic when the audience thought of him as younger, and so was changed from a hardened criminal to a genetic experiment, and Jumba became the scientist who created him.
One of the hardest parts about Stitch's characterization was that it's very difficult to read what kind of emotion he is feeling, mainly because his eyes don't have pupils. The animators largely got around this problem by making Stitch very physical.
The sign on Lilo's door is the Hawaiian word "kapu". It has cognates in other Polynesian languages, including Fijian "tabu" from which English "taboo" is borrowed. In context, it could be loosely translated as "Keep Out."
Most of the license plates in the film (the fire engine, gas tanker, and Nani's Beetle - but only at the end, not at "blue punch buggy" - plus one in Lilo's room) are A113. The same as Mrs. Davis's plate number in Toy Story (1995), Mater's plate number in Cars (2006), and also used in many other Disney and Pixar films. It is a reference to a room number at California Institute of the Arts, where many of the animators at those two companies received their educations. The fuel truck in the volcano has the license number "A113". A113 was the room for the animation department at the California Institute of the Arts (CalArts; the room now houses graphic design classes). During the 1970s, directors John Musker and Ron Clements, in addition to Disney/Pixar animation executive John Lasseter and Pixar director Brad Bird, studied animation in room A113. "A113" labels are hidden in many Disney and Pixar films.
In order to capture the traditional Hawaiian dance form - the hula - correctly, Disney took a camera crew to a renowned halau, a hula school. All of the introductory hula dance is modeled (though not rotoscoped) on sequences captured at the halau.
After some of the previous animated features like The Emperor's New Groove (2000) and Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001) had not been as successful as the films of the Disney Renaissance, then-Disney CEO Michael Eisner decided that the studio should try their hand at a smaller scale and a less-expensive film. The idea was inspired by Dumbo (1941) which was made at the studios for relatively little cost in the wake of the more expensive productions Pinocchio (1940) and Fantasia (1940).
The character of Cobra Bubbles, voiced by Ving Rhames, bears a marked resemblance to the gangster he played in Pulp Fiction (1994), right down to the same earring.
Chris Sanders, one of the directors of the film, also served as co-screenwriter, co-character designer, and provided the voice of Stitch, a character he first created in 1985. Chris Sanders had originally created the character of Stitch in 1985 for an unsuccessful children's book pitch.
Near the beginning of the film, during the trial, Stitch is asked by the council woman to provide some sign that he understands what's going on. Stitch responds by licking the inside of his glass cage. The saliva trail is in the shape of the famous 'D' in the Walt Disney logo.
First feature length animated film to be set on Hawaii.
Producer Clark Spencer has revealed the story was originally placed in an isolated town in Kansas rather than on Kauai.
Disney promoted this movie with a series of trailers inserting Stitch into some of its "classic" titles. Examples: