Elin
Feminine
Elin is overwhelmingly a girls’ name — 5,052 girls against 152 boys since 1880.
Elin is Helen in two places at once — Swedish and Welsh — and the Welsh one has a road attached. Elen of the Hosts is credited in Welsh tradition with the building of the Roman roads across the country.
How old is the name Elin?
Elin first appears in US birth records in 1893 — 132 years ago. The typical Elin is a kid of about 12 — this name's wave is very recent. About 4,700 people named Elin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
When was the name Elin most popular?
Elin peaked in 2011, reaching #662 nationally. Today it ranks #3067, 2,405 places below that high. See the whole 2011 chart.
Where it comes from
From Helene to Elin
The story of Elin
Elen Luyddog, Elen of the Hosts, appears in the Mabinogi as a British princess who marries a Roman emperor and asks him to build roads across her country so that her armies can move — the old Roman roads in Wales are called Sarn Elen for her. Whether her name is Helen or a native Welsh one is argued. Swedish Elin is separate: a medieval form of Helen that has been in continuous Scandinavian use. Both reach American records, the Swedish one more often.
Meaningnot established
Not established
Helen's meaning has never been settled. A connection to helene, 'torch', is the most commonly offered and is not secure; a link to selene, 'moon', has also been proposed and requires a sound change nobody has demonstrated. The name is older than the Greek that would explain it. Welsh Elen may be a separate native name entirely, and Swedish Elin is a straightforward form of Helen.
How the name formed
- Helene
- Elin
Related forms: Elen · Elin · Helen · Eline
Pronouncing Elin
EH-lin
Two syllables, stress on the first, the second reduced. Swedish gives the first vowel a slightly fuller sound; Welsh says EH-len with a clearer second vowel. American English often says EE-lin, which is a different first vowel.
Nicknames for Elin
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
- 1893
- Most girls named
- 2010386 — the highest on record
- Peak rank
- #662reached in 2011
- Change vs 2023
- −28.4%53 in 2025, from 74
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.
Elin in other languages
The same name elsewhere
- Elen in Welsh — spelling variant
- Elin in Swedish — same name
- Helen in English — related form
- Eline in Norwegian — related form
Strongest US states over the last decade: Minnesota, California, Texas.
Elins among us
people named Elin are estimated to be alive in the US today
About 1 girl in 30,326 born in 2025 was named Elin
Estimated from SSA birth records and published actuarial life tables. Method
Spellings of Elin
- #3067
- Elin on the 2025 chart
- #900
- counting every spelling
The SSA counts spellings, not names. Elin went to 53 girls in 2025, but Ellyn is the same name said out loud. Together the 2 spellings went to 60, which makes it the 900th most-given girls’ name of the year — 2,167 places above the chart.
- Elin53
- Ellyn7
About 1 girl in 26,788 born in 2025 was given one of these spellings — against 1 in 30,326 for Elin itself.
Spellings are grouped by a fixed rule that folds interchangeable English spellings of one sound (ck/k, ph/f, x/ks, a non-initial y for i) and keeps vowels apart, so Sean and Shawn stay separate names. It errs towards splitting: a family here is never larger than the truth. SSA national data, 2025. Method
Is it right for you
What happens to a name after it peaks
The Fabiola test
Every popular name lives one long story — a climb, a peak, a slow settling back. Elin's later chapters haven't been written yet, so we borrowed them: Fabiola climbed just as high around 1995, and its whole arc is on record. Line the two peaks up, and Fabiola's path sketches the road Elin is walking now.
Elin 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
Where Elin is headed
Elin is easing off slowly — about 30% fewer babies a year by 2030 if the trend continues.
Medium 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.
Elin beside its neighbors
The names ranked closest to Elin in 2025, in babies rather than position — the bars are to scale.
US girls given each name in 2025.
The trade-off
- Two ancestries, one Scandinavian and one Welsh, both of them substantial.
- Four letters, entirely phonetic, and easy for a small child to write.
- Ellie is a ready short form with a very wide English currency.
- Elin, Elen, Ellen and Eline all circulate and belong to different traditions.
- Its meaning is genuinely unknown, so any gloss offered is a guess among several.
- In the United States it is unfamiliar enough to be corrected to Ellen constantly.
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What they receive
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Elin
Feminine · #3067 in the U.S.
Frequently asked
- How many Elins are there in the world?
- No country counts the world's names, so there is no worldwide figure — anyone quoting one is estimating. About 4,700 people named Elin are estimated to be alive in the US today.
- How do you spell Elin?
- Elin is the most-used spelling in US records — 53 of the 60 babies given the name in 2025. The others recorded are Ellyn.
- How popular is the name Elin in 2025?
- Elin ranks #3067 among US girl names in 2025, with 53 babies given the name.
- How rare is the name Elin?
- About 1 in every 30,326 US girls born in 2025 was named Elin — 53 in all.
- Will my child share the name Elin with classmates?
- Elin will almost certainly be the only one in school.
Ranked beside Elin
Names sitting at a similar level of popularity right now.
Xitlaly#3067 · Finlee#3067 · Evany#3067 · Stacey#3067 · Mahnoor#3067 · Fabiola#3067 · Anissa#3067 · Melodi#3067
Looking for what else is popular rather than what resembles Elin? See the current top 100.
Choosing between Elin and another name?
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US figures from the Social Security Administration. 1880–2025. Data & methodology
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