Elias
Masculine · “my God is Yahweh”
Elias is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 129,263 boys against 239 girls since 1880.
Elias is the form Elijah took when the Hebrew Bible was translated into Greek, and it has been traveling ever since — through Latin, then into German, Swedish, Finnish, Spanish and Portuguese, keeping the same three syllables the whole way. The Finnish scholar Elias Lönnrot carried it while stitching together the Kalevala from oral song in the nineteenth century. In the mouth it opens softly and lands on the middle syllable, with the ready-made short form Eli sitting inside it.
How old is the name Elias?
Elias was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Elias is a kid of about 9 — this name's wave is very recent. About 121,000 people named Elias are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Elias most popular?
Elias peaked in 2025, reaching #13 nationally. Today it ranks #13, exactly where it peaked. See the whole 2025 chart.
Elias appears on these lists:
- America's top 100 names right now
- Vowel names: soft starts from A to O
- Gorgeous — and about to be everywhere
- Names at their all-time peak, right now
- Three-syllable names with room to move
- Five-letter names, the comfortable middle
- all guides
Works in Scandinavian families too:
Where it comes from
From Eliyahu to Elias
The story of Elias
The name begins as Hebrew Eliyahu, borne by the prophet of the Book of Kings. When Jewish translators in Alexandria rendered the scriptures into Greek, Eliyahu became Ēlias, and Latin took it from there as Elias — which is why medieval Europe knew the prophet by that spelling rather than Elijah. English later went back to the Hebrew for Elijah, but Elias stayed alive across the continent: standard in German and Dutch, common in Sweden, Norway and Finland, and written Elías in Spanish and Portuguese. Its recent rise in the United States sits on top of that long multilingual history rather than replacing it.
Meaning
my God is Yahweh
From the Hebrew name Eliyahu, built from El (God) and the divine name Yahweh.
Cultural footprint
Elias Howe (b. 1819) — Invented the sewing machine
Elias Canetti (b. 1905) — Nobel Prize-winning writer
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- Eliyahu
- Ēlias
- Elias
- Elijah
Related forms: Eliyahu · Elijah · Elías · Elia · Ilyas · Ilya
Pronouncing Elias
ee-LY-us
Most common in American English, though ih-LY-us is heard just as often. German and Scandinavian speakers say EH-lee-as, and Spanish speakers eh-LEE-as, with the stress on the second syllable and the accent written in: Elías.
Nicknames for Elias
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
- 1880
- Most boys named
- 20258,837 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #13reached in 2025
- Change vs 2022
- +31.3%8,837 in 2025, from 6,730
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.
Elias in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Eliyahu in Hebrew — same name
- Elijah in English — related form
- Elías in Spanish — spelling variant
- Elia in Italian — related form
- Ilyas in Arabic — related form
- Ilya in Russian — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: California, Texas, Florida. International figures from Statistics Canada, Office for National Statistics. Sources
Eliass among us
people named Elias are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 193 born in 2025 was named Elias
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Kenneth test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Elias's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Kenneth climbed just as high around 1939, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Kenneth's path sketches the road Elias is walking now.
Elias is climbing fast right now. Steep climbs tend to come with steep descents — the quicker a name arrives, the more firmly it belongs to its moment.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Elias is headed
Elias should hold steady through 2030 — the curve is flat, and flat curves are the most predictable kind.
High confidence — fitted on official counts through 2025.
A damped-trend projection of the official birth data — a sketch of momentum, not a promise. Every name's forecast, ranked.
Elias beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Elias in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Comes with Eli already attached — a short form that needs no explaining and works from preschool to a professional signature.
- Works in German, Swedish, Finnish, Dutch, Spanish and Portuguese with little or no change, which matters in a multilingual family.
- A documented record stretching from the Greek translation of the Hebrew Bible through medieval Latin Europe to the present.
- Familiar spelling: five letters, no silent characters, and phonetic once heard.
- Elias, Elijah and Eli are close cousins in sound and constantly mistaken for one another; expect to correct which one it is fairly often.
- The two pronunciations — ee-LY-us and eh-LEE-as — both have a genuine claim, so you will be choosing one and repeating it.
- This one is climbing steadily, and it shares a sound world with several other names much in the air, so a classroom may hold something similar even if it holds no other Elias.
Nobody names a baby alone.
Put Elias to the vote.
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What they receive
Someone added a name to your list
Elias
Masculine · #13 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Eliass are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 121,000 people named Elias are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Elias in 2025?
- Elias ranks #13 among US boy names in 2025, with 8,837 babies given the name.
- How common is the name Elias?
- About 1 in every 193 US boys born in 2025 was named Elias — 8,837 in all.
- Will my child share the name Elias with classmates?
- Roughly 1 in 8 classrooms will have a child named Elias.
Ranked beside Elias
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Levi#12 · Luca#14 · Jack#15 · Benjamin#11 · Sebastian#16 · Lucas#10 · William#9 · Hudson#17
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Elias? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Elias and another name?
See them side by side — full stats, history and a gentle verdict.
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US figures from the Social Security Administration; international figures from national statistics agencies. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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