Elex
Masculine · “defender”
Nobody knows where Alexander is buried. His body was hijacked on the way to Macedonia, taken to Egypt, and put in a tomb in Alexandria that Julius Caesar visited, Augustus visited — and reportedly damaged the nose of — and Caligula looted. Then it disappears from the record entirely.
How old is the name Elex?
Elex first appears in US birth records in 1888 — 137 years ago. The typical Elex alive today was born around 1941, making them about 84 years old. About 300 people named Elex are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Elex most popular?
Elex peaked in 1902, reaching #862 nationally. Today it ranks #12008, 11,146 places below that high. See the whole 1902 chart.
Lists built from the same records:
Where it comes from
From alexein to Elex
The story of Elex
The tomb was a landmark for three hundred years and then stops being mentioned. A late Roman writer says he was shown it; a century later another says nobody knows where it is. Since then something like a hundred and forty searches have been mounted in Alexandria, and the city's ancient street plan is largely under the modern one and partly under the sea. The name itself traveled better than the body. Alexander founded or renamed around twenty cities called after himself across three thousand miles, and several are still there under other names: Kandahar in Afghanistan and Khujand in Tajikistan are both Alexandrias, and the Egyptian one is the only one that kept the name.
Meaning
defender
Through Alex from Greek Alexandros, built on alexein, to defend or ward off, with andros, a man. Elex substitutes an e for the first vowel, which is reduced to nothing in speech and can be spelled either way.
How the name formed
- alexein
- Alexandros
- Alex
- Elex
Related forms: Iskandar · Aleksandr
Pronouncing Elex
EL-eks
Two syllables, stress on the first. Alex and Elex are said almost identically, since the first vowel is unstressed in both; the spelling simply chooses a different letter for it.
Nicknames for Elex
Moderate
What the data says
146 years of official birth records
The long climb, and where it stands now
The same years in position rather than babies
- First recorded
- 1888
- Most boys named
- 191917 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #862reached in 1902
- Change vs 2023
- −54.5%5 in 2025, from 11
Rank is a position, a count is a headcount, and they move independently — a name can hold its rank while the number of babies behind it falls. Source: U.S. Social Security Administration.
Elex in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Iskandar in Persian — related form
- Aleksandr in Russian — related form
Elexs among us
people named Elex are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 341,615 born in 2025 was named Elex
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
Fashion outlook
Elex sits in the calm middle of the cycle — neither chasing a wave nor sliding off one. Middle-of-the-cycle names age slowly and predictably.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Elex beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Elex in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- A settled Greek meaning with both elements traceable to ordinary words.
- One of the largest name families in the world stands behind it.
- Two syllables and an x, which makes it hard to mishear.
- Alex is overwhelmingly the standard spelling and this one will be corrected constantly.
- It is strongly represented among the oldest generations and reads clearly as of that time.
- It is a clipped form used as a full name, which reads as informal on paper.
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What they receive
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Elex
Masculine · #12008 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Elexs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 300 people named Elex are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Elex in 2025?
- Elex ranks #12008 among US boy names in 2025, with 5 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Elex?
- About 1 in every 341,615 US boys born in 2025 was named Elex — 5 in all.
- Will my child share the name Elex with classmates?
- Elex will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Elex
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Garfield#12008 · Chas#12008 · Lew#12008 · Barney#12008 · Dewitt#12008 · Granville#12008 · Cicero#12008 · Willam#12008
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Elex? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Elex and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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