Elijah
Masculine · “My God is Yahweh”
Elijah is overwhelmingly a boys’ name — 380,611 boys against 1,304 girls since 1880. See Elijah as a girl name
Elijah belongs to the prophet of the Hebrew Bible who confronted King Ahab and the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, and who leaves the story not by dying but in a chariot of fire. The Passover seder still sets out a cup for him. In English the name arrives in four unhurried syllables that settle onto the second — ih-LY-juh — and it shortens, as it has for centuries, to Eli.
How old is the name Elijah?
Elijah was already in use when US birth records began in 1880 — it is at least 145 years old. The typical Elijah alive today was born around 2010, making them about 15 years old. About 365,000 people named Elijah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Elijah most popular?
Elijah peaked in 2020, reaching #4 nationally. Today it ranks #7, 3 places below that high. See the whole 2020 chart.
Elijah appears on these lists:
- Beloved classics quietly disappearing
- Transatlantic hits: loved on both sides of the ocean
- America's top 100 names right now
- The top-10 club: every name that made it
- Vowel names: soft starts from A to O
- Generation Z names (born 1997–2012)
- all guides
Works in British families too:
Where it comes from
From Eliyahu to Elijah
The story of Elijah
The name is Hebrew, Eliyahu, and belongs to the prophet whose deeds fill several chapters of the Books of Kings, set in the northern kingdom of Israel in the ninth century BC. When the Hebrew scriptures were translated into Greek, and later into Latin, the name came through as Elias — the form that reached most of Europe and still stands in Spanish, German, Greek and Portuguese. English-speaking Protestants of the Reformation era went back past that route and took the Hebrew form more directly, which is how the spelling Elijah, with its j, became the English one. It has been in continuous use among English speakers ever since, and today it charts not only in the United States but in England and Wales, Canada and Scotland.
Meaning
"My God is Yahweh" — Hebrew Eliyahu
Built from El, "God", and the divine name Yahweh; the sense is a declaration of allegiance rather than a description.
Cultural footprint
Elijah Wood (b. 1981) — The Lord of the Rings' Frodo
Elijah Cummings (b. 1951) — Longtime congressman and civil rights champion
Source: Wikidata — the one source on this page that is not an official agency.
How the name formed
- Eliyahu
- Elias
- Elijah
Related forms: Eliyahu · Elías · Elias · Ilya · Ilyas · Elia
Pronouncing Elijah
ih-LY-juh
Stress on the second syllable. The j is an English j sound; the European cousin Elias is said EE-lee-ahs or eh-LEE-as instead, so Spanish- and German-speaking relatives may reach for that shape first.
Nicknames for Elijah
High
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
- 201613,982 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #4reached in 2020
- Change vs 2022
- −8.1%11,111 in 2025, from 12,094
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.
Elijah in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Eliyahu in Hebrew — transliteration
- Elías in Spanish — same name
- Elias in German — same name
- Ilya in Russian — same name
- Ilyas in Arabic — same name
- Elia in Italian — same name
Strongest US states over the last decade: Texas, California, Florida. International figures from Office for National Statistics, Statistics Canada, National Records of Scotland. Sources
Elijahs among us
people named Elijah are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 boy in 154 born in 2025 was named Elijah
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 Joseph test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Elijah's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Joseph climbed just as high around 1912, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Joseph's path sketches the road Elijah is walking now.
Elijah is coming down from a big peak (#4 in 2020). This is the stretch of the cycle where a name starts to sound like the decade it ruled.
A scored estimate from 146 years of naming cycles — not a prophecy. Great names outlive statistics. How this is scored
Where Elijah is headed
Elijah 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.
Elijah beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Elijah in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US boys given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Eli is a ready-made short form with centuries behind it, and it stands alone as a full given name if he prefers it.
- One dominant spelling in English, widely recognized on sight, with no competing variant fighting it.
- Documented without a break for roughly three thousand years, from the Books of Kings to this year's classrooms.
- Has close counterparts in Spanish, German, Russian, Arabic and Greek, so it travels with an equivalent already waiting.
- Charts across several English-speaking countries, not just the United States.
- This is a name he will share. In a school of any size there will likely be another Elijah, and more than one Eli, since Eli arrives from other names too.
- Elisha, Elias and Elijah are three different names that sound close and get swapped in speech and on forms. Expect occasional correcting.
- The biblical tie is strong and unmistakable — a pleasure for some families, more weight than others want on a name.
- Popularity is easing rather than collapsing, so it will read as familiar for his whole life rather than dated to one moment.
Nobody names a baby alone.
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What they receive
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Elijah
Masculine · #7 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Elijahs are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 365,000 people named Elijah are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How popular is the name Elijah in 2025?
- Elijah ranks #7 among US boy names in 2025, with 11,111 babies given the name.
- How common is the name Elijah?
- About 1 in every 154 US boys born in 2025 was named Elijah — 11,111 in all.
- Will my child share the name Elijah with classmates?
- Roughly 1 in 6 classrooms will have a child named Elijah.
Ranked beside Elijah
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Mateo#8 · James#6 · William#9 · Henry#5 · Theodore#4 · Lucas#10 · Oliver#3 · Benjamin#11
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Elijah? See the current top 100.
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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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